Myanmar policewomen fled home to escape ‘military wrath’. But they’re scared in Mizoram too

The women fled Myanmar in a hurry after they were allegedly ordered to shoot anti-coup protesters. Their road ahead looks uncertain.

Four Myanmarese refugees, including two policewomen, take in a view of Aizawl, a sea of lights at night, earlier this week | Amrita Nayak Dutta | ThePrint

Aizawl: A 22-year-old serving as a policewoman in Myanmar, where the military pulled off a coup on 1 February, fled to Mizoram two weeks ago. At the time, she told herself it would all be over soon. Normalcy would be restored in her homeland, and she would be able to go back to her family and job.

The hope is getting bleaker as the days pass, she told ThePrint this week from her hideout on the outskirts of Aizawl, where she arrived to seek refuge. 

She is no longer sure when she will see her family again. And adding to her worries are fears she will be identified and deported to Myanmar, where she is fairly certain she will be punished for fleeing her country. 

“I will be killed if I’m deported. The mildest of the punishment would be a jail term for life,” she said. 

Earlier this month, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) made it clear where the central government stands on the Myanmarese refugees arriving in India in the wake of the coup. In a 10 March order, it told the four states bordering Myanmar — Mizoram, Manipur, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh — and the border-guarding force (Assam Rifles) to check the influx from across the border.

It further cited earlier guidelines to call for the migrants to be identified and deported, emphasising the fact that India is not a signatory to the United Nations (UN) refugee convention. 

With the refugees finding a sympathetic welcome in Mizoram, where residents share deep ethnic and familial ties with the Myanmarese, the government noted that states had no authority to grant refugee status to anyone. 

While the Mizoram government has refused to turn back the refugees, and petitioned the central government to adopt a lenient view, an atmosphere of uncertainty now marks the days of the dozens of refugees who have escaped Myanmar since last month amid reports of human rights excesses.

The predicament is tougher for the 22-year-old and the other police personnel who have fled. 

Back home, they claim, they were being forced to open fire on compatriots protesting against the coup.

They could not bring themselves to follow the orders, but disobeying the military came with harsh ramifications, they told ThePrint. Fleeing — with all its potential consequences — seemed to be the only option.

An arduous journey

The 22-year-old arrived in India with some of her police colleagues from the Tedim town in Chin state, which shares an over-400-km border with Mizoram. 

Over a two-day journey, they travelled in open trucks and walked for several kilometres before reaching the Mizoram border, from where they were picked up by a car. The car then travelled through the serpentine hilly state roads to get them to this secret location in the hinterland. Local NGOs on both sides assisted with the transport and other logistics.

Among the group that fled Myanmar with the 22-year-old policewoman was a 24-year-old colleague. Speaking to ThePrint, the latter said she hasn’t contacted her parents since she arrived here, for fear of being traced.

Sitting cross-legged on a mattress spread on the floor in a small dingy room that has been her home for the past fortnight, the 24-year-old talked about her hurried escape.

“I just informed my parents I will flee my country for sometime and left within a day,” she said.

She didn’t have time to pack an extra pair of clothes or sanitary napkins, or even food for the journey. She did carry roughly Rs 3,000 in cash, of which she only has Rs 1,000 left. 

The location where the two women are staying near Aizawl is home to 53 other refugees as well. Ten among the 55 are women. 

One of them is from the military, and another a fireman, while all the others are police personnel. 

A narrow lane strewn with construction waste leads to the house where the two policewomen, along with a few others, share a dimly-lit makeshift room with tin walls. The space is covered with mattresses, and sacks — of donated rations and other essentials — are stacked in the corners.

The room where the two policewomen live with a few other refugees | Amrita Nayak Dutta | ThePrint

In hiding, their only contact with the outside world is a large window built into the walls, through which, every evening, they stare at the sea of lights that Aizawl is at night.

This shelter has been arranged for the women by a Mizo who owns the house.

Expenses for their food and other essentials are being met through donations, which the Mizoram resident said are pouring in from local civil society organisations.

Talking to ThePrint, he said police personnel face a greater risk than civilians if they return home because they not only disobeyed orders, but also illegally fled the country. 

“That is why they travelled far from the borders and have been kept away in utter secrecy here,” he added.

The fact that police personnel have been fleeing Myanmar is something the authorities there are acutely aware of, and something they wish to check. Earlier this month, the authorities in a Chin state district reportedly wrote to their counterparts in Mizoram’s Champai, asking for the return of eight police personnel.

Seeking the handover of the personnel to Naypyitaw as a friendly gesture, they invoked the “friendly relations between the two neighbouring countries”.

The Mizoram man who has provided shelter to the refugees knows it is a risky prospect, but he is undaunted. “I would do it for anyone in need, not just my ethnic brethren,” he said.

‘Waiting for normalcy to return’

Two other police personnel, both men and aged 24 and 31, had travelled with the two policewomen mentioned above. Both have exhausted their money, and their immediate aim is to “somehow assimilate” among the local Mizos so they can find work as casual labourers at stone quarries.

The 24-year-old policeman, who can speak a smattering of the Mizo language, said his wife and sister are still in Myanmar, adding that he “is hopeful they are unharmed”. He hasn’t been able to contact them since he arrived here. 

“I will wait for the democratic government to come back before I return,” he said. “Then I will possibly be forgiven and perhaps be able to join the police again.”  

Describing the events that unfolded in Myanmar in the days after the coup, he said his area was relatively calm initially. “Our particular duty area was not affected by protests,” the young policeman said. “But then the protest rallies began — from once in a day, it kept on increasing.” 

The 24-year-old said it was on 1 March that they were issued orders to shoot at protesters to stop the protests. “We refused to take the orders. From 6 March onwards, we stopped going to office, abandoned our posts and joined the CDM (civil disobedience movement). We fled on 9 March,” he said. 

Under Myanmar law, the 31-year-old added, police personnel are not supposed to quit service on their own. This, he said, was the most critical push for him to flee the country. He left behind a family of nine, including his wife and a daughter barely two. He doesn’t know when he will get to see them again.

Both of them said they destroyed their police ID cards just before entering the border as they did not want to get caught and turned back.

Local support

The refugees from Myanmar have found a groundswell of support among the local Mizos, especially from civil society organisations such as student body Mizo Zirlai Pawl (MZP) and NGO Young Mizo Association (YMA), which, along with churches, wield much influence in the state. 

Over the past few weeks, several groups have organised protests across Aizawl to express solidarity with their ethnic brethren in coup-hit Myanmar. At a protest Tuesday, copies of the 10 March MHA order were set on fire. 

C.V. Lalmalsawmi, who is pursuing her doctorate at Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), said civil society organisations play a vital role in the socio-cultural functioning of the close-knit Mizos. 

“While the church wields a significant influence in the religious sphere, the YMA is the most powerful and pervasive agent in the social lives of the Mizos and enjoys wide-ranging legitimacy within the state,” she added. 

“However, the Mizo Zirlai Pawl, as the apex Mizo students’ body, has been the driving force behind cultural inclusivity among the Zohnahthlak (a branch of the Mizos), under which come Chin and Kuki tribes,” Lalmalsawmi added. 

“The MZP’s strong show of solidarity with the Chins in Myanmar with the ongoing crisis must also be seen in this context.” 

Talking about the immense outpouring of support for refugees in Mizoram, she said it stems from a deep understanding of their plight and the “lived experiences over the past decades of both the Mizos and the Chins”. 

“Apart from the common ancestry, culture, and religion, there is an intricate network of kinship and relationship across the Mizoram-Myanmar border which cannot be easily unpacked from a distant, cold, pragmatic New Delhi,” she said. 

The past few years of democratic transition in Myanmar, she added, have “allowed greater interactions and better mutual understanding and helped build a more positive image of Myanmar for the Mizos”. “There is a lot at stake in terms of livelihood too,” she said. 

MZP general secretary Lalnunmawia Pautu refused to comment on the role the organisation is playing in the current crisis. He, however, told ThePrint that the organisation will demand that the Myanmarese nationals in India be given refugee status.   

Vigil stepped up on border

Following the MHA’s order, the Assam Rifles stepped up vigil along the border to check further influx of Myanmarese nationals.  

However, Mizoram Chief Minister Zoramthanga expressed his displeasure over the order in an 18 March letter to PM Narendra Modi, where he said India could not turn a blind eye to the “humanitarian crisis unfolding in front of us in our own backyard”. This, even as, in the wake of the MHA directive, his government withdrew a standard operating procedure issued to border districts, aimed at helping the refugees.

However, despite the push from the Mizoram government, the central government reiterated its stand on the refugees in Parliament last week.

A senior state government official told ThePrint that they are officially following the MHA order. “Whatever our political bosses are doing, they are doing so of their own accord. We are abiding by the MHA orders,” the official said.

Edited by Sunanda Ranjan