India’s Vanishing “Burma Colonies”. Repatriation, Urban Citizenship, and (De)Mobilization of Indian Returnees from Burma (Myanmar) since the 1960s

This article examines the social and political mobilization of Burmese communities of Indian origins, who repatriated from Burma (Myanmar) back to India between the 1960s and 1980s. Drawing on recent fieldwork carried out in several Indian cities, this paper explores the sociopolitical world subsequently created by these repatriated communities within the urban and peri-urban spaces they were resettled in—spaces thereafter known throughout India as “Burma Colonies”. Interviews have revealed how the returnees have mobilized around issues of urban housing, land and property rights, and organized themselves to protect their emerging business interests in local “Burma Bazaars,” and to secure the welfare of their community. The research suggests that their struggle has proved a critical component of their search for urban, and subsequently national, citizenship rights in the erstwhile homeland they were returning to. Political activism and social mobilization using specific urban spaces have therefore greatly facilitated the (re)integration of these returnees into the wider Indian public realm. However, most Burmese repatriate settlements have progressively been absorbed by a sprawling “Indian” urban and political landscape. Furthermore, the second generation of returnees—now well integrated into India’s citizenry—has mostly demobilized. India’s “Burma Colonies” have therefore today lost much of their significance as specific sites of mobilization for citizenship, the article concludes.

Abstract licence: CC BY-NC-ND

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