Patel called the proposed transfer “monstrous.” Nehru said Radcliffe had “no business to touch” the Chittagong Hill Tracts. CHT representatives protested the decision, while India and Pakistan even discussed whether the territory could instead go to India. On India’s 80th Independence Day, those documents raise an even more painful question about what happened to the Indigenous homeland they were trying to protect.
The Chittagong Hill Tracts Partition remains one of the most disputed chapters of the 1947 division of British India. In August 1947, the Chittagong Hill Tracts became part of Pakistan. Today, that can sound like a simple fact of Partition—as if the territory naturally belonged on the Pakistani side when British India was divided.
The documents from August 1947 tell a very different story. Letters, legal notes, confidential meeting records and contemporary newspaper reports show that the decision to place the Chittagong Hill Tracts, or CHT, in East Bengal was fiercely disputed.
Indian leaders questioned whether the Boundary Commission should have dealt with the territory at all. They pointed to its overwhelmingly non-Muslim population, its special constitutional status and the wishes of its inhabitants. Representatives from the Chittagong Hill Tracts themselves went to Delhi seeking help, and even after the boundary decision had been prepared, senior Indian and Pakistani leaders discussed whether the CHT could still be transferred to India.
These were not arguments invented decades later. They appear in documents written during the final days of British rule.
An Overwhelmingly Non-Muslim Territory
The demographic situation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts was very different from most of East Bengal. A legal note prepared by Indian constitutional adviser B. N. Rau on August 14, 1947 cited the 1941 population of the Hill Tracts as approximately 247,000, of whom only about 7,300 were Muslims.
In other words, roughly 97 percent of the population was non-Muslim. The population consisted overwhelmingly of Indigenous hill peoples, including Chakmas, Tripura and other communities. Many followed Buddhism, while others followed Hinduism, Christianity and other non-Muslim faiths.
But demography was only one part of the dispute. The Chittagong Hill Tracts had also been classified as an Excluded Area under the Government of India Act, 1935, meaning that its inhabitants did not participate in the Bengal legislature in the same way as people in ordinary districts.
That special status became important when Bengal was divided. Indian officials argued that the people of the Hill Tracts had not been represented in the political process that led to Partition, yet their homeland was being transferred without a referendum.
August 13: CHT Representatives Went to Vallabhbhai Patel
On August 13, 1947, a delegation from the Chittagong Hill Tracts met Vallabhbhai Patel in New Delhi. They had heard that their homeland might be awarded to East Bengal.
Patel immediately wrote to Lord Mountbatten, and his language was unusually strong. He described the possibility of giving the Chittagong Hill Tracts to East Bengal as “so monstrous.”
Patel told Mountbatten that if such a decision were made, the people of the Hill Tracts would be justified in resisting it and could count on India’s “maximum support” in such resistance. He also argued that no fair reading of the Boundary Commission’s terms of reference could justify making a “ninety-seven per cent non-Muslim area” part of East Bengal.
This was not simply a complaint about India losing territory. Patel was questioning whether the Boundary Commission had the authority to make such a decision.
Patel Said the People Wanted to Remain With India
Patel also referred to evidence gathered by the Tribal Areas Committee. According to his letter, the evidence showed that the population of the Chittagong Hill Tracts wanted to remain in the Indian Union.
There was, however, no referendum in the CHT. That distinction is important because Patel was reporting the evidence and representations available to him; the inhabitants were never given a direct vote in which they could formally choose between India and Pakistan.
Patel also raised a strategic concern. The Chittagong Hill Tracts bordered the princely state of Tripura, which had joined India, and he feared that placing the CHT in Pakistan could create difficulties for Tripura as well.
Toward the end of his letter, Patel warned Mountbatten that a decision contrary to the wishes of the local population could produce deep “bitterness and rancour.” Before the Radcliffe Award became public, one of India’s most powerful leaders was therefore already warning that the CHT decision could become a serious political problem.
August 14: B. N. Rau Questioned the Process
The following day, B. N. Rau prepared a legal note titled “The Chittagong Hill Tracts and the Boundary Commission’s Award.” Rau was one of the leading constitutional experts of the time, and his argument was significant because it went beyond religious demography.
He stressed the special constitutional position of the Hill Tracts. Because the territory was an Excluded Area, its inhabitants had no normal representation in the Bengal legislature and therefore had little opportunity to participate in the political process through which Bengal was divided.
Rau argued that transferring such a territory without properly hearing its inhabitants raised a question of natural justice. His note also recorded the demographic reality that only around three percent of the population was Muslim.
The controversy was therefore becoming not only political but legal.
August 16: The Dispute Reached the Highest Level
On August 16, 1947, a confidential meeting took place at Government House in New Delhi to discuss the Boundary Commission awards. Among those present were Lord Mountbatten, Jawaharlal Nehru, Vallabhbhai Patel, Liaquat Ali Khan, Fazlur Rahman, Baldev Singh, Mohammad Ali, V. P. Menon and V. F. Erskine-Crum.
The surviving minutes provide one of the most important records concerning the fate of the Chittagong Hill Tracts. Nehru said he had never considered it possible for the CHT to be allocated to East Bengal under the Boundary Commission’s terms of reference, and the minutes record that eminent lawyers had supported that interpretation.
Nehru also pointed to the territory’s status as an Excluded Area and its absence from the Bengal legislature. According to the minutes, he said that he and his colleagues had repeatedly assured representatives from the Chittagong Hill Tracts that their territory would not be included in Pakistan.
The meeting record described the CHT population as overwhelmingly Buddhist and Hindu. Nehru maintained that the people themselves preferred India and argued that “on religious and cultural grounds, the Chittagong Hill Tracts should form part of India.”
Then came perhaps the most memorable sentence in the entire record: “Sir Cyril Radcliffe had had no business to touch them.”
For Nehru, this was not merely disappointment over losing territory. He questioned whether Radcliffe should have dealt with the Chittagong Hill Tracts at all.
Pakistan Argued the Opposite
The meeting did not produce agreement. Fazlur Rahman, representing the Pakistani position, defended the allocation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts to East Bengal and argued that the decision was permissible under the Boundary Commission’s terms of reference.
Economic geography was also raised. The Hill Tracts had strong connections with Chittagong, including through the Karnaphuli River and the wider economic system centred on Chittagong. For the Pakistani side, separating the CHT from Chittagong created practical and economic problems.
This disagreement is important because the archival documents do not show that everyone accepted the Indian argument that Radcliffe had exceeded his authority. Instead, they reveal a direct dispute at the highest level over the legal, demographic, cultural and economic arguments surrounding the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
Could the CHT Still Have Gone to India?
The August 16 meeting then took a remarkable turn. Mountbatten discussed a possible compromise under which most of the Chittagong Hill Tracts could come under Indian administration while East Bengal retained areas connected with the Karnaphuli River.
Nehru objected because such an arrangement would divide the territory. Instead, he wanted the whole Chittagong Hill Tracts to go to India, with India later providing Pakistan whatever river or economic facilities might be necessary through an agreement.
This shows that the CHT’s inclusion in Pakistan was still being discussed as something that might be altered. The discussion then went even further.
Mountbatten Proposed a Territorial Exchange
Mountbatten raised another possibility: the Chittagong Hill Tracts could be transferred to India, while a predominantly Muslim area that had been awarded to India could be transferred to Pakistan.
In other words, senior leaders were actually discussing a territorial exchange that could have placed the CHT inside India. Liaquat Ali Khan did not accept the proposal, arguing that Pakistan considered the Boundary Commission awards more broadly unfavourable and was unwilling to deal with the Chittagong Hill Tracts as an isolated adjustment.
The proposal therefore went nowhere. But its existence is historically significant because it shows that, at the highest political level, the fate of the Chittagong Hill Tracts was not regarded as completely settled.
August 17: The Radcliffe Award Became Public
The Bengal Boundary Commission Award became public on August 17, 1947. The Chittagong Hill Tracts were placed in East Bengal and therefore became part of Pakistan.
For the Indigenous peoples of the region, the international border had been decided, but the controversy had not ended.
August 19: “Radcliffe Report On Chittagong Hills Untenable”
Two days later, The Hindustan Times in New Delhi published a striking report under the headline “Radcliffe Report On Chittagong Hills Untenable.”
The report said that responsible circles considered the decision concerning the Chittagong Hill Tracts untenable. It presented the argument that the Hill Tracts had not properly fallen within the matters referred to the Boundary Commission and that Radcliffe had exceeded his powers by proposing their inclusion in East Bengal.
The newspaper highlighted the demographic issue in a single sentence: “Muslims form only three per cent. of the population there.”
A surviving scan of the newspaper clipping bears the watermark of the National Archives of India. The report is important because it shows that the dispute had moved beyond private correspondence and confidential meetings and had entered the public debate within days of Partition.
August 25: Sneha Kumar Chakma Demanded Reversal of the Award
The people of the Chittagong Hill Tracts did not simply accept the decision in silence. On August 25, 1947, Sneha Kumar Chakma, General Secretary of the Chittagong Hill Tracts Peoples Association, sent a telegram to Vallabhbhai Patel.
The telegram protested the inclusion of the Hill Tracts in Pakistan and called for the decision to be reversed. It stated: “The people of Chittagong Hilltracts vehemently protest against the award and pray for its reversal.”
The message also said that a deputation had started out. This document is especially important because much of the surviving record consists of Indian leaders describing what they believed the people of the CHT wanted, while this telegram provides a direct protest from a representative organization of the Chittagong Hill Tracts itself.
The inhabitants of the region were therefore not merely being discussed by outside political leaders; their representatives were formally protesting the decision.
So Why Did the Chittagong Hill Tracts Go to Pakistan?
There is no single document that provides a complete answer, but the archival record makes several things clear. The Chittagong Hill Tracts were overwhelmingly non-Muslim, and their Indigenous inhabitants had not participated normally in the Bengal legislature because of the territory’s Excluded Area status.
Representatives from the CHT approached Indian leaders before the border became public, and Patel strongly opposed its transfer to East Bengal. B. N. Rau raised legal and procedural objections, while Nehru said Indian leaders had assured CHT representatives that the territory would not be included in Pakistan.
At the August 16 meeting, Nehru argued that the entire CHT should go to India. Mountbatten discussed giving most of the CHT to India and even proposed exchanging the territory for a Muslim-majority area elsewhere.
Pakistan rejected making such an isolated adjustment. Ultimately, Radcliffe’s boundary placed the Chittagong Hill Tracts in East Bengal.
Did Radcliffe Act Illegally?
This question needs careful wording. Patel believed the decision was contrary to the Boundary Commission’s proper terms of reference, while B. N. Rau developed a legal argument questioning the procedure and Nehru said Radcliffe had “no business” dealing with the territory.
Pakistani representatives rejected that interpretation. Fazlur Rahman argued that placing the Chittagong Hill Tracts in East Bengal was permissible under the terms of reference.
The surviving documents therefore do not, by themselves, establish a universally accepted legal conclusion that Radcliffe acted illegally. What they establish beyond serious dispute is that the transfer of the Chittagong Hill Tracts to East Bengal was fiercely contested from the beginning—on demographic, constitutional, legal, cultural and political grounds.
The Most Important Voice Was Not Radcliffe’s
There is another way to read these documents. The most important people in this story were not Radcliffe, Mountbatten, Nehru, Patel or Liaquat Ali Khan; they were the people who lived in the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
Their homeland was being discussed in Delhi. Their religion was counted, their culture discussed, their economic future debated and their strategic location calculated. Their representatives travelled to political leaders and sent protests, yet they were never given a referendum to determine which new state should govern their homeland.
That is perhaps the central tragedy hidden inside the archival papers: the people of the Chittagong Hill Tracts had a voice, but they did not have the final decision.
On India’s 80th Independence Day: Why 1947 Still Hurts
On August 15, 2026, India marks its 80th Independence Day, 79 years after achieving independence from British rule. For millions of Indians, it is a day to celebrate freedom, but for the Indigenous peoples of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, the history of 1947 carries a very different emotion.
The documents from that year described the CHT as roughly 97 percent non-Muslim, with its population overwhelmingly made up of Indigenous hill peoples. Their representatives protested the prospect of being placed in Pakistan, approached Indian leaders and later demanded that the Radcliffe decision be reversed.
What followed over the next eight decades profoundly transformed the region. Scholarly research has documented large-scale state-sponsored Bengali resettlement in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, particularly from the late 1970s and through the 1980s, contributing to dramatic demographic change in what had once been an overwhelmingly Indigenous region.
The consequences were not limited to population numbers. Land loss, displacement, militarisation, communal violence and disputes over political authority became central features of the modern history of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
The armed conflict between the Bangladesh state and the Shanti Bahini formally ended with the 1997 Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord. Yet many of the issues behind the conflict remain unresolved, including disputes over ancestral land, implementation of key provisions of the Accord, security, political representation and the authority of Indigenous institutions.
Recent international human-rights reporting continues to raise concerns about marginalisation, land dispossession, violence and insecurity affecting Indigenous communities in the region. The Indigenous World 2026 report by the International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs also records continuing human-rights violations affecting Indigenous peoples in Bangladesh.
This is why the documents of August 1947 are more than old papers preserved in archives. They record a moment when the Indigenous inhabitants of the Chittagong Hill Tracts were actively trying to influence the political future of their homeland, but the final decision was made without a referendum among the people whose territory was being transferred.
On India’s 80th Independence Day, the contrast is difficult to ignore. India celebrates the freedom it achieved in 1947, while across the border the Indigenous peoples of the Chittagong Hill Tracts continue to struggle over ancestral land, identity, culture and political rights.
The question that began in 1947 has therefore changed. Then, the immediate issue was whether the Chittagong Hill Tracts would remain with India or become part of Pakistan. Today, another question has become equally painful: How much of the Indigenous character of the Chittagong Hill Tracts will survive?
A Border Was Settled, but the Historical Question Remained
The Radcliffe Award settled the international boundary, but it did not settle the historical debate. The documents of August 1947 show that another future for the Chittagong Hill Tracts was seriously considered.
Patel opposed its transfer to East Bengal, Nehru argued that it should form part of India, and Indian legal advisers questioned the process. Mountbatten considered alternative territorial arrangements, while Pakistan defended the decision to include the region in East Bengal.
Most importantly, representatives of the Chittagong Hill Tracts themselves protested and asked for the award to be reversed. Their actions make it difficult to portray the transfer simply as an administrative decision accepted by everyone concerned.
The history that followed gives those documents an importance far beyond the mechanics of Partition. They force us to look again at a familiar map and consider whose wishes mattered when that map was drawn—and whose did not.
The question is therefore no longer simply why the Chittagong Hill Tracts were given to Pakistan. Nearly eight decades of demographic change, conflict and unresolved questions of land and political rights have made the historical issue much larger.
What might the history of the Chittagong Hill Tracts have looked like if the people who lived there had been allowed to decide their own political future?
Sources and Further Reading
Primary Historical and Archival Sources
- Sardar Patel’s Correspondence, 1945–50, Volume IV
One of the most important primary-source collections for this article. Relevant documents include Document 167, Vallabhbhai Patel’s letter to Lord Mountbatten dated 13 August 1947; Document 169, Jawaharlal Nehru’s 15 August letter to Patel enclosing B. N. Rau’s legal note of 14 August; and Document 170, Sneha Kumar Chakma’s telegram of 25 August 1947 demanding reversal of the CHT award. - “Dissatisfaction with the Boundary Commission Award” — 16 August 1947, The Nehru Archive
Reproduces the confidential meeting involving Lord Mountbatten, Jawaharlal Nehru, Vallabhbhai Patel, Liaquat Ali Khan and others. It contains Nehru’s argument that the Chittagong Hill Tracts should form part of India, his statement that Radcliffe had “no business to touch them,” Mountbatten’s proposed territorial adjustments and Liaquat Ali Khan’s response. - Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru, Second Series, Volume 4 — The Nehru Archive
The published collection from which the 16 August 1947 Boundary Commission meeting record is reproduced. The relevant material appears on pp. 3–5. - Reports of the Bengal Boundary Commission and Punjab Boundary Commission — Radcliffe Awards
Government of India publication containing the official Boundary Commission reports and the Radcliffe Awards. It records the Commission’s terms of reference and the final boundary decisions. - Census of India, 1941 — Bengal Tables
Official 1941 census material useful for checking the population and religious composition of the Chittagong Hill Tracts before Partition. - Government of India Act, 1935
The constitutional legislation relevant to the status of Excluded Areas. Sections 91–92 are particularly relevant to understanding the special administrative position of areas such as the Chittagong Hill Tracts. - National Archives of India — Abhilekh Patal
Official portal for accessing digitised and catalogued records held by the National Archives of India. Some of the archival pages and the Hindustan Times clipping used in this article bear the National Archives of India watermark. - British Library Archives and Manuscripts Catalogue
Catalogue for the British Library’s archival collections, including the India Office Records. The original record of the 16 August 1947 meeting is identified in the published source as L/P&J/10/117, India Office Records. - British Library — Guide to India Office Records in the Discovery Catalogue
Explains how researchers can locate India Office Records and related archival references through the British Library and UK National Archives cataloguing systems. - Towards Freedom: Documents on the Movement for Independence in India, 1947, Part I
Contains additional documentary material relating to the political situation before Partition, including records concerning the Chittagong Hill Tracts Hillmen Association and its efforts to influence the future of the region.
The Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord and Its Implementation
- Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord — 2 December 1997, United Nations Peacemaker
Full English text of the agreement signed between the Government of Bangladesh and the Parbatya Chattagram Jana Samhati Samiti. - UN Study on the Status of Implementation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord of 1997
United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues document E/C.19/2011/6, examining implementation of the 1997 Accord and unresolved issues affecting the Indigenous peoples of the CHT. - Peace Accords Matrix — Chittagong Hill Tracts Peace Accord
University of Notre Dame’s Peace Accords Matrix provides detailed information on implementation of individual provisions of the CHT Accord, including refugees, internally displaced persons, security, political institutions and other commitments.
Demographic Change, Settlement and Land
- Bhumitra Chakma, “Demographic Engineering: Population Resettlement in the Ethnoterritory of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh”
Published in Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 59, Issue 1, 2025, pp. 234–264. A major academic study of state-directed population resettlement and demographic transformation in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. DOI: 10.1017/S0026749X25000010. - Amnesty International — Pushed to the Edge: Indigenous Rights Denied in Bangladesh’s Chittagong Hill Tracts
Detailed report on Indigenous land rights, displacement, disputes with Bengali settlers, military presence and the incomplete implementation of the 1997 Accord. - Amnesty International — Indigenous Peoples Engulfed in Chittagong Hill Tracts Land Conflict
Summarises Amnesty International’s findings on land dispossession, conflict and the failure to fully restore Indigenous traditional lands after the peace agreement.
Recent Indigenous Rights and Human-Rights Sources
- IWGIA — The Indigenous World 2026: Bangladesh
Current 2026 overview of the situation of Indigenous Peoples in Bangladesh. It reports continuing human-rights concerns and records at least 268 reported incidents of human-rights violations during 2025 affecting more than 600 Indigenous people. - UN Special Procedures Communication to Bangladesh — AL BGD 4/2025
A 2025 communication by UN human-rights experts addressing Indigenous rights issues in Bangladesh, including concerns relating to the Chittagong Hill Tracts, land, legal protections, self-governance and the CHT Regulation of 1900. - UN Special Procedures Communication concerning Indigenous land and environmental rights in the CHT — 2025
Addresses allegations involving land grabbing, displacement of Indigenous families and environmental impacts in the three hill districts of Bandarban, Rangamati and Khagrachhari. - UN Special Procedures — Communication on Violence and Indigenous Rights in the Chittagong Hill Tracts
An earlier but detailed UN communication addressing allegations of land dispossession, Bengali settlement, military presence, violence, displacement, attacks on Indigenous villages and the lack of full implementation of the 1997 CHT Accord.
India’s 80th Independence Day
- Government of India — 80th Independence Day Celebrations, 15 August 2026
Official Press Information Bureau announcement confirming that India marks its 80th Independence Day on 15 August 2026.
Archival and Print Sources Without a Confirmed Direct Public Document Link
- The Hindustan Times, New Delhi, 19 August 1947. “Radcliffe Report On Chittagong Hills Untenable.”
Contemporary newspaper report stating that the CHT portion of the Radcliffe Award was considered “untenable” in responsible circles and noting that Muslims formed only about three percent of the population. The surviving scan used for this article bears the watermark of the National Archives of India. The exact public catalogue URL for this clipping has not yet been identified. - India Office Records, File No. L/P&J/10/117.
Original archival file containing the proceedings of the 16 August 1947 meeting on the Boundary Commission Awards. The record is cited in Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru, Second Series, Volume 4, pp. 3–5. The India Office Records are held by the British Library. - Chittagong Hill Tracts Commission, Life Is Not Ours: Land and Human Rights in the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh. May 1991, with subsequent updates.
An important historical investigation into land dispossession, settlement, militarisation and human-rights conditions in the CHT. - Shapan Adnan and Ranajit Dastidar, Alienation of the Lands of the Indigenous Peoples of the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh. Chittagong Hill Tracts Commission, 2011.
Detailed study of Indigenous land alienation and land disputes in the CHT. - Amena Mohsin, The Politics of Nationalism: The Case of the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh. Dhaka: University Press Limited.
Major scholarly work on nationalism, state policy, Indigenous identity and the political conflict in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. - Amena Mohsin, The Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh: On the Difficult Road to Peace. Boulder, Colorado: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2003.
Examines the historical conflict, peace process and continuing challenges surrounding the Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord. - Julian Burger and Alan Whittaker, The Chittagong Hill Tracts: Militarization, Oppression and the Hill Tribes. London: Anti-Slavery Society, 1984.
An important early study documenting militarisation, settlement and the situation of the Indigenous peoples during the armed-conflict period. - Raja Devasish Roy, “The Population Transfer Programme of the 1980s and the Land Rights of the Indigenous Peoples of the Chittagong Hill Tracts.” In Living on the Edge: Essays on the Chittagong Hill Tracts, edited by Subir Bhaumik, Meghna Guhathakurta and Sabyasachi Basu Ray Chaudhury.
A detailed examination of the population-transfer programme and its relationship to Indigenous land rights. - Syed Aziz-al Hasan and Bhumitra Chakma, “Problems of National Integration in Bangladesh: The Chittagong Hill Tracts.” Asian Survey, Vol. 29, No. 10, 1989.
Academic analysis of the political and demographic dimensions of the CHT conflict. - The original National Archives of India scans reproduced in this article.
Several surviving historical pages carry the National Archives of India watermark. Where an exact catalogue or file number cannot yet be established, the image should be captioned with its visible date, document type and National Archives of India provenance rather than assigning an unverified archival reference.
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