Crises Faced by the Hill Peoples of Bangladesh: Following up Löffler’s Prescient Insights

Lecture by Shapan Adnan, Professorial Research Associate, SOAS, University of London and Member of the Chittagong Hill Tracts Commission.

Lorenz Löffler documented land alienation, economic impoverishment and ethnic domination affecting the Mru and other Hill peoples, as well as the chain reaction of agro-ecological degradation destroying the very productive capacity of their lands and traditional avenues of survival. He highlighted the devastating impacts of misconceived development projects, counter-insurgency operations and state-sponsored transmigration of settlers. Löffler foresaw the catastrophic implications of these trends for the Hill peoples.

In this lecture, Shapan Adnan draws on his own field research conducted over 1998–2018 that provides tragic confirmation of Löffler’s prescient apprehensions and updates the continuing crises faced by the Hill peoples despite their persistent but increasingly divided resistance.