At midnight on Saturday, August 1, one of the greatest geographical curiosities disappeared. If there are several hundred enclaves on the globe completely surrounded by the territory of another country, the “triple enclave” of Dahala Khagrabari was a unique case: this piece of India was the size of a stadium football and was located within a part of Bangladesh, which in turn is located within a larger part of India, all within Bangladesh. A game of Russian dolls that ended with the entry into force of a historic agreement between the two countries that quite simply exchanged their respective enclaves.

Dahala Khagrabari is part of a real constellation of enclaves that surrounded the border between India and Bangladesh. There were 111 Bangladeshi enclaves in India and 55 Indian enclaves in Bangladesh, with a total population of more than 50,000 people according to the last census. For the inhabitants – who had the choice of staying on their land, staying in a new country or returning to the country of their nationality – it was a liberation: caught between two states, they were practically at their mercy – themselves. Francetv info looks back at the history of these territories.

How did these enclaves come into being?

This situation is not, as legend has it, the result of ink stains left on a map by a British colonist, or of chess games between two local rulers in which villages served as trophies. According to Willem Van Schendel, a researcher at the University of Amsterdam, it all goes back to The Journal of Asian Studies (in English), on the border defined in the 17th century between the Mughal Empire in the south and the Kingdom of Cooch Behar in the north. At that time, lords sometimes owned land in the area dominated by Cooch Behar but remained Mughal subjects and vice versa. These inhabitants did not have the same sovereignty as their neighbors but could move freely: there was neither a border nor a real state.

During colonization, the Mughal Empire came under the direct control of the British Empire, while the Kingdom of Cooch Behar became a princely state, vassal of the British but headed by a local ruler. This divergence explains why the two territories were separated at the time of independence: the south was annexed to East Pakistan (the future Bangladesh) in 1947, while the north joined India two years later. The former Mughal subjects living in Cooch Behar then became Pakistanis in India, and the subjects of Cooch Behar, living in isolation in Mughal and then British territory, became Indians in Pakistan. This is the birth of enclaves separated from neighboring territories by borders that cannot be crossed without a visa.

Why do they make the lives of their residents so complicated?

Trapped on tiny land surrounded by a foreign country, its inhabitants experience grotesque situations. These deserted areas are frowned upon by the surrounding population. Forbidden from trading with foreigners but forced to break the law to survive, their inhabitants are compared to smugglers and the local police do not shy away from confiscating their goods. Their territory, a lawless zone where there are no police officers, is also accused of serving as a haven for criminals who do not shy away from attacking villagers whom no one wants to defend. And to leave their village, landlocked residents need a passport and visa.

Quoted by Bangladeshi daily The Daily Star (in English)Aziza Rahman, who lives in an Indian enclave in Bangladesh, tries to explain this dilemma to a police officer: “All residents of the enclaves enter the territory illegally. We cannot survive if we do not enter Bangladesh.”. “In an enclave there is nothing – no schools, no health services, nada” explains the newspaper. Aziza Rahman was arrested while looking for work and spent 16 days in prison. If he had wanted to obtain a passport and visa, he would have had to travel to his country of nationality, India, and cross Bangladesh, at the risk of returning to prison.

In 2010, Indian police tried to prevent a pregnant Bangladeshi woman from leaving her enclave to go to the hospital: “They told me I was Bangladeshi and that they couldn’t take care of me”, she explains it Indian Times (in English). After several hours of negotiations and while a crowd had gathered on the spot, the police finally gave in when the young woman fainted. Her son was finally born in the Indian hospital. For you, “[son fils] has shown the world that we don't belong anywhere. : neither in India nor in Bangladesh, which do not provide the necessary health services to the residents of the enclaves.

Only one of these areas is an exception: the enclave of Dahagram, one of the largest, which includes three villages and where Pakistan and then Bangladesh maintain a police presence. To get there, says Willem Van Schendel, the police had to cross the 178-meter stretch between the Bangladesh border and the enclave, hoping that the Indian police would not shoot at them. Since 1992, the situation has normalized: border posts have been installed on both sides of the road, which now allow passage throughout the day, which has enabled the development of the area. However, with a size limitation: the inhabitants have no electricity because India refuses to allow power lines to cross its territory.

Will the end of the enclaves solve the problem?

“Freedom at midnight, after 68 long years”, Headline on Thursday Indian Times (in English)and told of the jubilation of the people of Moshaldanga, whose enclave of Bangladesh was to become an integral part of India. “This is the most important moment of my life. I can't describe how I feel today.”A resident interviewed by AFP on the other side of the border was delighted. “I will become a Bangladeshi citizen with all the rights that come with it.” The residents of the enclaves are de facto stateless and, if they stay, will receive the citizenship of the countries surrounding them and the freedom to move around as they please. According to the Indian broadcaster NDTV, this is the decision of all residents of the Bangladeshi enclaves in India. They will all become Indians.

But the transition is not necessarily easy for the residents of Indian enclaves in Bangladesh. Thousands of them preferred to settle in India. AFP met some of them are Hindus, who say their decision is partly motivated by fear of living in a Muslim country. Other residents say they would have liked to leave but were not consulted, or that their names have disappeared from the lists: they are stuck in Bangladesh and fear becoming stateless. Reports the Dhaka Tribune (in English).

The new neighbors are not always as hospitable as hoped. When residents of a Bangladeshi enclave went to an Indian village in May to celebrate the announcement of the new law, they were greeted by armed men. “They told us, 'Turn around or get ready to get hit.'” one of them tells Vice News (in English). In the evening, Indians arrived in their village and set fire to a house. But to the general surprise of the residents, who had resigned themselves to being attacked with impunity, one of these troublemakers was arrested by the Indian police. A sign that life may be changing a little for the people of these enclaves, now a thing of the past.