Mohammed Abdul Gaffar (1910–1966), also known as Abdul Gaffar, was a politician from

Arakan Arakan ( or ) is a historic coastal region in Southeast Asia. Its borders faced the Bay of Bengal to its west, the Indian subcontinent to its north and Burma proper to its east. The Arakan Mountains isolated the region and made it accessi ...

Burma Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...

(now

Rakhine State Rakhine State (; , , ; formerly known as Arakan State) is a state in Myanmar (Burma). Situated on the western coast, it is bordered by Chin State to the north, Magway Region, Bago Region and Ayeyarwady Region to the east, the Bay of Ben ...

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...

). He was elected to the

Legislature of Burma The Burma Legislature was the legislative body of British Burma from 1936 to 1947. As an elected body, the Legislature of Burma was a bicameral legislature consisting of the 36-seat Senate and the 132-seat House of Representatives. Establishment ...

in British Burma from

Buthidaung Buthidaung (, ) is a town in Rakhine State, in the westernmost part of Myanmar (Burma). It is the administrative seat of the Buthidaung Township. Buthidaung lies on the west bank of the Mayu river, and experienced severe flooding in June 2010 and ...

in 1947. After Burmese independence in 1948, the President of Burma

Sao Shwe Thaik Sao Shwe Thaik ( shn, ၸဝ်ႈၶမ်းသိူၵ်ႈ, ''Tsaw³ Kham⁴soek³''; my, စဝ်ရွှေသိုက်, ; 16 October 1895 – 21 November 1962) was a Burmese politician who served as the first president of the U ...

appointed Gaffar as one of the seven members of the Inquiry Commission of Arakan in 1949. Gaffar was elected to the

Chamber of Nationalities The Chamber of Nationalities ( my, လူမျိုးစုလွှတ်တော်) was the upper house of the bicameral Union Parliament of Burma (Myanmar) from 1948 to 1962. Under the 1947 Constitution, bills initiated and passed by the ...

from

Akyab Sittwe (; ; formerly Akyab) is the capital of Rakhine State, Myanmar (Burma). Sittwe, pronounced ''sait-tway'' in the Rakhine language, is located on an estuarial island created at the confluence of the Kaladan, Mayu, and Lay Mro rivers emp ...

West constituency in 1952. He was elected from

Maungdaw Maungdaw (, ) is a town in Rakhine State, in the western part of Myanmar (Burma). It is the administrative seat of Maungdaw Township and Maungdaw District. Maungdaw is a town of Myanmar and borders Bangladesh. Maungdaw is 16 miles north of But ...

in 1956. He also served as Parliamentary Secretary for the Ministry of Health in the government of

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister i ...

U Nu Nu ( my, ဦးနု; ; 25 May 1907 – 14 February 1995), commonly known as U Nu also known by the honorific name Thakin Nu, was a leading Burmese statesman and nationalist politician. He was the first Prime Minister of Burma under the pr ...

. Gaffar was a member of the Rohingya community of Arakan, a state with the largest percentage of Indians in Burma. In 1949, Gaffar presented a memorandum to the Regional Autonomy Enquiry Commission describing Arakanese Indians as the "

Rohingya The Rohingya people () are a stateless Indo-Aryan ethnic group who predominantly follow Islam and reside in Rakhine State, Myanmar (previously known as Burma). Before the Rohingya genocide in 2017, when over 740,000 fled to Bangladesh, an ...

", based on the colloquial terms ''Rohang'' and ''Rohan'', the local Indian names of the region.

Early life

Gaffar was born in 1910 in the Rwanynotaung village of

in Arakan Division,

Burma Province ( Burmese) , conventional_long_name = Colony of Burma , common_name = Burma , era = Colonial era , event_start = First Anglo-Burmese War , year_start = 1824 , date_start = ...

British India The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance on the Indian subcontinent. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one ...

. His father was Ulah Meah. Gaffar attended the Chittagong Senior Madrasa in the

Bengal Presidency The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William and later Bengal Province, was a subdivision of the British Empire in India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and ...

, where he completed his secondary school studies in 1924. He completed a

bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Middle Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate academic degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six ...

from the

University of Dacca The University of Dhaka (also known as Dhaka University, or DU) is a public research university located in Dhaka, Bangladesh. It is the oldest university in Bangladesh. The university opened its doors to students on July 1st 1921. Currently it ...

in 1930 and a

Bachelor of Education A Bachelor of Education (B.Ed.) is an undergraduate professional degree which prepares students for work as a teacher in schools. In some countries such as Tanzania and Kenya, additional tasks like field work and research are required in order fo ...

degree from Aligarh Muslim University in 1933. He served as a District Inspector of Schools (DIS) in Akyab from 1931 to 1942 and as a Township Officer (T.O) of Buthidaung from 1944 to 1945.

Political career

During the 1947 Burmese general election, Gaffar was elected to the Burmese constituent assembly as a representative of the Buthidaung constituency. On 4 January 1948, he took oath as a legislator of the Union of Burma. The first president of Burma appointed Gaffar as one of the seven members of the Inquiry Commission of Arakan in 1949. During the Burmese general election, 1951-52, he was elected to the Burmese

upper house An upper house is one of two chambers of a bicameral legislature, the other chamber being the lower house.''Bicameralism'' (1997) by George Tsebelis The house formally designated as the upper house is usually smaller and often has more restric ...

, the Chamber of Nationalities, as a representative of Akyab West. During the

1956 Burmese general election General elections were held in Burma to vote for 202 out of 250 seats to the Burmese Chamber of Deputies; the remaining 48 members (all from the Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League, AFPFL) were elected unopposed as no opposition candidates stood ...

, he was elected to the chamber as a representative of Maungdaw and Buthidaung. The first prime minister of Burma appointed Gaffar as parliamentary secretary to oversee the Ministry of Health.

Memorandum of Appeal

On 20 November 1948, Gaffar presented a Memorandum of Appeal to the Principal Secretary of the Government of the Union of Burma asking for recognition of the Arakanese Indians as one of the "official nations" (ethnic groups) of Burma under the name Rohingya. The memorandum was published in the ''Guardian Daily'', an English newspaper in Burma, on 20 August 1951.

''We the Rohingyas of Arakan are a nation. We maintain and hold that Rohingyas and Arakanese are the two principal nations in Arakan. We are a nation of nearly 9 lakh, which is sufficient for the population of a nation; and what is more is that we are a nation according to any definition of a nation, with our own distinctive culture and civilization,
language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of ...
and literature, art and architecture, names and nomenclature, sense of value and proportion, legal laws and moral codes, customs and calendar, history and traditions, aptitude and ambitions; in short, we have our distinctive outlook on life and of life. By all canons of
international law International law (also known as public international law and the law of nations) is the set of rules, norms, and standards generally recognized as binding between states. It establishes normative guidelines and a common conceptual framework for ...
the Rohingyas are a nation in Arakan.''

Political legacy

Despite Gaffar's call for constitutional recognition of his community, and increased Rohingya political participation in the 1950s; the Indian minority in Arakan faced discrimination after the

1962 Burmese coup d'état The 1962 Burmese coup d'état on 2 March 1962 marked the beginning of one-party rule and the political dominance of the army in Burma (now Myanmar) which spanned the course of 26 years. In the coup, the military replaced the civilian AFPFL- ...

. The 1982

Burmese nationality law The Nationality law of Myanmar currently recognises three categories of citizens, namely citizen, associate citizen and naturalised citizen, according to the 1982 Citizenship Law. Citizens, as defined by the 1947 Constitution, are persons who b ...

rendered the community stateless, by failing to recognize the Rohingya as one of Burma's "national races". Rohingyas are restricted from state education, government jobs and freedom of movement in Myanmar, with the conditions being described as similar to

apartheid Apartheid (, especially South African English: , ; , "aparthood") was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s. Apartheid was ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Gaffar, M. A. Burmese Muslims Burmese politicians Rohingya politicians Aligarh Muslim University alumni University of Dhaka alumni People from Rakhine State 1910 births 1966 deaths

Early life

Political career

Memorandum of Appeal

Political legacy

See also

References