Union home minister Amit Shah has said India would fence the porous 1,643km boundary the same way in which Indian government have fenced the country’s border with Bangladesh, which is more than twice as long.
Mr Shah said the government would also consider scrapping a six-year old free movement agreement, allowing border residents from India and Myanmar to travel 16km into each other’s territory without a visa.
But the move would be fraught with challenges – some experts say the mountainous terrain makes a fence all but impossible. And India’s plans could destabilise the equilibrium that has existed for decades between peoples in the border area, as well as stirring up tensions with its neighbours.
Meanwhile, people from Manipur, Nagaland and Mizoram have opposed the central government’s move.
The border splits people with shared ethnicity and culture. Mizos in Mizoram and Chins in Myanmar are ethnic cousins, with cross-border connections, especially as the predominantly Christian Chin State borders Mizoram. There are Nagas on both sides of the border, with many from Myanmar pursuing higher education in India. Hunters from Walong in Arunachal Pradesh have come and gone across the border for centuries.
Not surprisingly, Mizoram, defying federal government directives, has sheltered more than 40,000 refugees who have fled the civil war in Myanmar.
Nagaland Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio, said recently: “We have to work out a formula on how to solve the issue for the people and prevent infiltration as well, because Nagaland is bordered by Myanmar, and on both sides there are Nagas.”
Also, experts believe that fencing the mountainous and densely forested border will pose significant challenges.
“To fence off the entire border would be impossible given all the mountains along the border and the remoteness of the terrain. It won’t be like building a fence along the border with Bangladesh,” Bertil Linter, a well-known Myanmar expert, told a BBC reporter.
“A fence is impractical, would take years to build and even if is was built at some places, local people would find ways around it.”
- Various sources