Share Them With The World - Magazines of Resistance

The Call of the Rohingya

When he opened up the bag, Habi and I looked at each other. We couldn’t believe it. Later he said, “Share them with the world”.

By Greg Constantine (November 15, 2024)

Habi Zullah and Ro Anamul Hasan— two members of the Rohingya archival team—had already spent months seeking out materials from Rohingya in sections of the refugee camps. I had just arrived in Bangladesh. I had been to the country over fifteen times since starting my work on the Rohingya in 2006. This was my first trip back for the project Ek Khaale. It was March 2023 just before the start of the holy month of Ramadhan. Solim was one man who had already shared a few documents to the project. The first time Habi, Anamul and I met Solim together, he was skeptical, or at least it felt that way. Guarded would be a more accurate description. The heat inside Solim’s hut was sweltering. He turned on several small electric fans which pushed the air around the room.

We sat on the floor and talked. He shared some old, original National Registration Cards of his grandfather, father and mother with us. After some time, Solim had come to embrace our visit. We asked if he had more. He went into another room in his hut and came back carrying a jute (burlap) tote bag that zipped and had a lock. He sat down, unlocked it and proceeded to pull out several large plastic bags, each protecting stacks of fragile and faded papers and family documents. Land and taxation documents dating back to the 1930s. Employment documents of relatives dating back to the 1920s. Old birth certificates. One of Solim’s children brought in snacks, watermelon and tea for us.

For the next hour or so, Solim sifted through one document after another. Placing a page of an old land document on the floor between us, pointing out dates and other details. He repeated this over and over again. The documents and his narration guided us through the history of his family.

Solim was born in Maungdaw in 1967. He was well connected with other men his age in the camp. He carried an ancient, beat up, Nokia-like cell phone. No games, apps, email, social media, internet. Just a durable, unbreakable phone with buttons and a monochrome display. His thumb pushed up and down buttons as he scrolled through a basic rolodex of names and phone numbers saved on his phone. During our first visit, Solim made a number of calls on that phone and not long after each call, another Rohingya man (older in age) who lived in a different section of the camp would show up to Solim’s hut. Each carried their own bag of documents, eager to share them with us. At one point during that first visit, there were ten of us sitting together on the floor. Each man comparing family histories through their portfolio of documents. Most had never shared these documents with others before. Solim asked us to come back the next morning. He said he would find others. (Continued below…)

The next day Habi and I arrived and several men were waiting outside of Solim’s hut. Solim had called them the night before. Each held folders or small bags. Solim’s son let us in. He said Solim had woken up incredibly early that morning and had already been gone for well over an hour. But, he would return home soon. Not long after, Solim arrived home, sweating and breathing deeply as if he had walked quite a distance. He carried another bag. “I’ve kept these for a very long time. I don’t keep these things here,” Solim said. “In Myanmar I hid them and I needed to hide them here too. Someone outside of the camp keeps them for me.”

We sat on the floor. The other men who were waiting outside sat down with us. His son brought us more snacks, watermelon and tea. Solim opened up the bag and took out a stack of papers from another bag. They were torn and ripped and had a heavy smell of stale smoke. When he opened up the bag, Habi and I looked at each other. We couldn’t believe it. I knew Rohingya liberation groups had printed their own magazines but I had never seen one. Now, Solim handed us a stack of 34 original issues of the magazine Arakan, ‘The Original Mouthpiece of the Arakan Rohingya Islamic Front’. The issues span from 1992 to 1995, a time corresponding to the years immediately after Operation Pyi Thaya or Operation Clean & Beautiful Nation, which forced over 250,000 Rohingya out of Burma into Bangladesh.

Rohingya liberation groups from the 1970s through the early 2000s published their own magazines and journals. The publications served as a voice for Rohingya to the international community. Magazines included historical pieces, analysis of current events in Burma and in depth updates on the persecution of the Rohingya community throughout these decades.

We spent the day with Solim. A steady stream of older Rohingya men rotated sitting on the floor, eager to share their family documents with us. At the end of the day, Solim looked at the stack of magazines, turned to Habi and I and said, “Share them with the world.”

Months later, Habi and I revisited Solim. His home became a gathering point where other men, who had preserved and carried similar treasured documents to Bangladesh during the violence of a genocide in 2017, met with us. Recently Habi told me, “Solim always checks in with me. He is always excited to hear about the project. He said he never had a chance to share these magazines with anyone before, until he met us.”

Another Rohingya elder would contribute copies of even older publications and magazines from Rohingya liberation groups printed in the 1970s and 1980s and more recent issues from the early 2000s. (Continued below…)