Implementation of Indigenous environmental heritage rights: an experience with Laitu Khyeng Indigenous community, Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh

Abstract

It is undeniable that the global environmental crisis disproportionally affects individuals and communities, particularly Indigenous communities are among those most deeply affected. The history of Chittagong Hill Tracts Bangladesh colonialism is a history of the dispossession of Indigenous peoples of the lands that they and their ancestors have inhabited and cared for and of the imposition on them of destructive “development” policies. This paper addresses the ongoing environmental heritage conflict between the Laitu Khyeng Indigenous community’s traditional environmental management practices and state development projects in Chittagong Hill Tract. Drawing from a relational research methodology, this study shows how the nation-state controls Indigenous land, water, and management practices through multinational agencies. This paper asks, “In CHT, why must Indigenous cultural heritage be connected to the past, present, and future to invoke state legal protection?” and “How can we move toward a more rights-based approach to heritage management?”