This paper analyses the historical events of Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) and an effort has been taken to identify the root causes of the prevailing tensions. The key argument is the fabricated history which is creating disparities in the understanding of the Government of Bangladesh (GOB) and the tribal communities of CHT. Some vested corners and feudal classes always tried to do politics by exploiting the emotion of the general tribal populations of CHT. It has been observed that the tribal populations badly suffered in different times of history due to inappropriate decisions of their leaders; maximum times they moved against the flow and the course of actions they have decided was not welcomed by their counterparts. Sometimes personal interest of the feudal classes got priority instead of community well-being. In the early 1960s, the enormous sufferings of the mass tribal populationscaused by ‘Kaptai Dam’ was acceptable to Chakma Circle Chief Tridiv Roy. Although Bangladesh as a country was not responsible for any of the sufferings of the tribal communities in CHT, they started an armed insurgency movement against the GOB in 1976. After the peace accord in 1997, the insurgents did not deposit maximum of their illegal arms to the GOB as promised, rather there are four different fractions of tribal regional parties at present. All the parties are maintaining armed groups for area domination and easy illegal tax collections. Besides these challenges, there are enormous potentialities in CHT; if those are well-nurtured, there likely to have effective changes in the socio-economic and political sectors. In the upcoming days, the development and economic solvency of the general people might become a situation changer in CHT.

Highlights

• Insurgency situation and post peace accord scenario of CHT.
• The backwardness of CHT occurred due to haughty attitude of feudal classes, inappropriate decisions of the tribal leaders and inadequate participations of local tribal communities in the national politics.
• Enormous potentials of CHT need to be explored for economic development.