Rohingya refugees evicted after power, water cut to their shelters
Weeks after authorities disconnected basic utilities, police forced dozens of Rohingya Muslims to vacate their settlement, deepening an already dire humanitarian crisis
JAMMU AND KASHMIR (MNTV) — Dozens of Rohingya refugees have been forced to dismantle their shelters and leave a settlement in Indian-administered Jammu after police arrived late Wednesday, just weeks after authorities cut off electricity and water supplies to the area.
The displaced families — numbering between 30 and 40 people — had lived for years in makeshift shanties near Nideesh Enclave in the Channi Rama area. Local officials said the land belonged to a private citizen from Rajouri district who had allowed them to stay temporarily.
But following complaints from a residents’ association claiming “law and order concerns,” the administration ordered the refugees to vacate the site immediately.
“We removed our shanties today, but we do not know where to go,” one refugee told local reporters. Another woman said her family had been without power and water for nearly three weeks before police forced them out. “We came to Jammu four years ago and settled here,” she said.
Police reportedly informed the families they would be taken to a “holding center” at Kathua Jail — a facility where Rohingya refugees have been detained since 2021 under what authorities call “verification drives.” The number of Rohingyas held there has now risen to 283, including 60 children and 84 women, according to jail officials.
Rights observers say the eviction forms part of a wider campaign of intimidation against Rohingya Muslims in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir, where officials have routinely labeled them “illegal migrants” and “security threats.”
In December 2024, authorities carried out a similar operation, cutting water and electricity to other Rohingya settlements across the region.
Human-rights advocates describe the latest eviction as a continuation of India’s hardening stance against Muslim refugees — particularly under Hindu nationalist narratives that portray them as outsiders. Many of the refugees had fled genocidal violence in Myanmar’s Rakhine State, only to face detention and hostility in India.
For families already displaced multiple times, the loss of shelter in Jammu marks yet another cycle of dispossession.
As the refugees prepare to be relocated to detention facilities, aid workers warn that the move deepens an already fragile humanitarian crisis — one that underscores the growing weaponization of refugee policy across South Asia.
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