Rohingya women trafficked to India on promises of ‘a good life’ face threat of indefinite detention

Young Rohingya women forced to endure inhumane conditions in Bangladesh’s refugee camps are not only at risk of being trafficked to countries like India, they also face being detained there indefinitely for “violating immigration laws”.

It is a fate suffered by those such as Rubina Akhtar, who left the congested shanty-camp community of Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh to come to West Bengal, India. A survivor of sexual assault, Rubina had instead become an outcast among outcasts.

“He came into my house when I was all alone, and threatened me with a knife before taking advantage of me,” Rubina told This Week in Asia from where she had been staying with relatives in West Bengal since arriving in December last year.

Rubina, who recently turned 15, said the perpetrator was a “much older” man with two wives and children, and was also a commander of a Rohingya militant group.

“He had been asking for my hand in marriage for months, but my parents refused because I was too young. So, he attacked me, saying he would make sure no one else in the camp would want to marry me,” Rubina said.

Too impoverished to hurriedly arrange for the customary dowry to marry off their daughter to any Rohingya boy in the camp after the assault, the only plausible step for them was to hand their daughter to a broker who agreed to help her cross the border to reach India in December.

For Rohingya girls like Rubina who are trafficked from Bangladesh to India, the first predators to take advantage of them are often those from within their own community – trusted friends and relatives.

One of Rubina’s uncles paid the broker a sum for helping the girl reach West Bengal. He is now waiting to marry her off and will ask her future husband for a larger sum in return,