‘My name is Mohammad Arman. I’m a Hafiz-ul-Quran. After completing my Quran memorisation from a madrasah at Raimankhali of Maungdaw in Rakhine State, I was a class seven student of a Qaumi madrasah before leaving home. The Myanmar military soldiers and local Buddhists burnt down the three-storied Islamic institution. They also did not give us permission for Adhan (call to prayer). Our local mosque where my villagers and I offered our prayers was also torched a day before we flee from there.’

A Rohingya Quran memoriser (Hafiz-ul-Quran) Mohammad Arman, in his early twenties, came up with remarks on September 14 while talking the NTV Online correspondent at the zero point of Ghumdhum border.

Arman, among the United Nations (UN) estimated nearly 400,000 refugees, fled Myanmar’s violence-hit Rakhine State since August 25 and entered Bangladesh border points in Ukhia and Teknaf of Cox’s Bazar.

Ghumdhum at Naikhongchari in Bandarban is one of the border points where Rohingyas have been entering into Bangladesh territory to escape persecution in the Rakhine state of Myanmar. There is a small canal named ‘Tombru’ flowing at the point and a no-man’s land on the bank of creek. A long barbed wire fence with Myanmar is seen from the Bangladesh’s side of the zero point.

Around 1200 families took shelter in makeshift camps made with black polythene on one side of the canal. Border Guard Bangladesh members have cordoned them off and are keeping close vigilance so that they cannot proceed further within Bangladesh territory.

Vividly describing his perilous journey to enter Bangladesh border, sufferings, dreams and current situation to the correspondent, Hafiz Arman grieved saying, ‘My dreams to serve Islam accomplishing Islamic knowledge were shattered after the military men and Mogs had burnt down my madrasah and mosque.’

‘I am hopeless and feeling helpless in Bangladesh as I miss my mosque, my madrasah, my homeland and my people very much. It’s very suffocating and dirty place; there are no toilets or bathrooms. I’m now alive eating dry food and even the dry food is not given to us in the no-man’s land area,’ he narrated.

‘I want the Bangladesh government help us to go back to my homeland Myanmar’s Rakhine so that we can study and live in peacefully like Buddhists and other citizens of the country,’ urged Arman.

He said, ‘Our local elected representatives were Muslims. The Arakan Muslim representatives were forced to step down their posts after 2015. The politicians, who were not Rohingya Muslims and residents of other areas of Myanmar, were made our local representatives. The torture on Rohingya Muslims momentously commenced after that.’

Showing a video footage to the correspondent, Arman said, ‘Once the Nasaka guys were obliged to respect the elected Rohingya Muslim representatives. But they were forced to leave the country.’

While asked whereabouts of the representative, he replied, ‘They fled Myanmar in different times to escape arrests and killings and I heard that they took shelter in America, Australia, Malaysia and other countries.’

The Rohingyas at the no-man’s land are getting food and other services from Bangladesh side if the BGB permits. After collecting their necessary valuables and relief materials they are going back other side of the line drawn by the canal. The temporary shelter is different from Kutupalong and Balukhali camps in two ways. It is built on no-man’s land where people don’t have easy access. Relief materials are not easily reached to the makeshift shelters like other camps. In front of them, border guards block entry to Bangladesh. Behind them, the Myanmar Army plants deadly land mines to prevent their return.

The Rohingya are fleeing from a Myanmar military offensive in the western state of Rakhine that was triggered by a mass exodus to Bangladesh since on August 25.

Some of the Rohingya there said they are too afraid to go back to their homes but not ready to abandon them altogether and become refugees in Bangladesh.

Over 100 bodies believed to be those of Rohingya Muslims washed ashore at Jaliar Ghat and Shah Porir Dwip till September 14, highlighting the risks many of the persecuted minority is taking to flee violence in neighbouring Myanmar.

Ghumdhum area of Bandarban is the exotic jewel in Bangladesh’s tourist crown. It is now a nightmare no-man’s land for 12,000 Rohingya families frantic for food, water and medical aid.

On September 14, it was seen from zero point near Tombru at Ghumdhum border under Bandarban hill track district and from the Shah Porir Dwip jetty on the shore of Naf River at Teknaf that heavy smoke was coming from the villages at Rakhine, suggesting houses had been recently set alight. The Rohingya are fleeing from a Myanmar military offensive in the western state of Rakhine that was triggered by a mass exodus towards Bangladesh since on August 25.

It was seen that limited shelter capacity in Kutupalong and Balukhali makeshift camps is already exhausted. Refugees are now squatting in makeshift temporary shelters that have mushroomed along the road and near the available land of hill at Cox’s Bazar’s Ukhiya. While most of Rohingya refugees arrive on foot, mostly walking through the jungle and mountains for several days, thousands are braving long and perilous voyages across the rough seas of the Bay of Bengal. They arrive in poor condition, exhausted, hungry and desperate for food.

Many Rohingyas took shelter on both sides of the Cox’s Bazar-Teknaf Highway, especially from Ukhiya to Teknaf. Many were seen cutting nearby hills to build shelters with bamboos and other materials. Rohingyas were found desperate for food and shelters.  When a relief-laden vehicle arrives at Rohingya camps, hundreds more people run after it for collecting the food materials. But feeble, sick, elderly and children cannot able to win the fight of getting their food.

The humanitarian agencies are getting concerned since the number of refugees is still rising. Anywhere between 10,000 to 20,000 are still entering Bangladesh every day. Bangladesh is already host to more than 400,000 Rohingya refugees who have fled Buddhist-majority Myanmar since the early 1990s and many of the new refugees are hungry and sick.