Bihari from Bangladesh
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Camps have seen little maintenance in 35 years and suffer from a severe lack of water and sanitation. 4000 people live in Kurmi Tola Camp in the Mirpur district of Dhaka. The camp has less than a handful of working water pumps and is littered with garbage and raw sewage.
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During Pakistani rule, the Urdu-speaking Bihari in Bangladesh were once a prosperous and privileged community but lost everything. After the civil war in 1971, they were fired from government jobs, lost ownership of their land and fled into camps to protect themselves and also to await possible repatriation to Pakistan. Unrecognized as citizens of both Pakistan and Bangladesh, the Bihari belong to no country and sink further into the dark margins of society. Thirty-five years later, some 200,000 Bihari continue to live an impoverished, hand-to-mouth existence inside the same camps throughout Bangladesh where they are denied most social, civil and economic rights, like this woman in a camp in Saidpur.
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Before 1971, the Bihari owned land and held government jobs. A 60-year-old man in Pat Godam Camp in the town of Mymensingh holds a photo of himself at the age of 19.
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Without citizenship, an entire generation of Bihari were denied an education. Prior to 2003, Bihari children in camps were denied access to all levels of government public schools. The blackboard reads, 'Allah is one and Mohammed is His Prophet.'
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Two young boys work behind textile looms in Football Camp in Dhaka. Like many Bihari families, the inability to access social services, poverty and the lack of economic opportunities force children into the workforce.
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It is not uncommon for men to leave their wives to marry local Bengali women simply to obtain the rights afforded from Bangladesh citizenship. Left by her husband, this 20-year-old girl has no family to help support her and her young baby. She makes paper bags for money. She is now going blind in both eyes and has no access to healthcare.
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Camps have seen little maintenance in 35 years and suffer from a severe lack of water and sanitation. 4000 people live in Kurmi Tola Camp in the Mirpur district of Dhaka. The camp has less than a handful of working water pumps and is littered with garbage and raw sewage.
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In March 2004, the Bangladesh government discontinued all food relief to the camps, making it even more difficult for families to provide for themselves. Most women continue to give birth to an average of 4 to 6 children. Two in five babies born to the Bihari live to the age of five. Exhausted and sick, a mother rests with her newborn twins. Only weeks old, both already suffer from malnutrition.
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Without citizenship status, the Bihari have no social safety net supporting them. Most Bihari in camps do not have access to healthcare, as less than a handful of camps have clinics. A sick 75 year-old-man sits alone in his room in Pat Godam Camp in Mymensingh. He has no remaining family and is unable to obtain any healthcare.
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Most camps are now comprised primarily of people born after 1971. Young Bihari across the country consider Bangladesh their home and feel it is essential to their cultural identity that they are recognized and provided with the rights granted to all Bangladeshi citizens. Bihari youth gather at a rally in Talab Camp in Dhaka.