Title: No man's land! Where do they belong?

Authors: Shailaja Menon

Addresses: School of Liberal Studies, Ambedkar University, Lothian Road, Kashmere Gate, Delhi, India

Abstract: This paper focuses on the tragedy visited on the people on the Indo-Bangladesh border, the victims of colonial cartography. Modern states and laws have continued to rely on colonial legislation for regulating the flows of people and one of the outcomes of the continuance (of such legislation) has been the hardening of identities in resource-conflict. The present research attempts to situate the study within the contours of Agamben's 'state of exception'. The public domain is dominated by the security concerns while those whose common property resources, farm lands and water bodies are located within the metaphoric fence are considered as collateral damage. The study is based on information gathered through the Right to Information Act 2005, field surveys, informal interactions with the affected people and structured interviews with people's elected representatives both in office and previous office-bearers.

Keywords: colonial cartography; fenced Indians; human security; borders; resource conflict; India; Indo-Bangladesh border; regulation; state of exception; identity.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMBS.2016.075577

International Journal of Migration and Border Studies, 2016 Vol.2 No.2, pp.187 - 198

Received: 12 Feb 2015
Accepted: 25 Aug 2015

Published online: 28 Mar 2016 *

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