Socio-Economic Impact on the Local Community Due to Settlement of Bhutanese Refugees in Sanishchare Camp: A Case Study of Sanishchare Village of Morang District

Abstract

“Being a refugee is not a choice; it is the absence of the choice”, says Ms. Carina Hoang, a former Vietnamese refugee and an award winning author of refugee stories. Citing Ms. Hoang’s statement, we can say that Bhutanese refugees have been living a life of no choice since early 1990s in the refugee camps of eastern Nepal. And with no doubt, their settlement has some impacts on local communities. The research or the study aimed to assess the socio-economic impact on the local community of Sanishchare village of Morang district due to settlement of Bhutanese refugees in Sanishchare Refugee Camp. For the accomplishment of the study, exploratory and descriptive research designs were opted. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected from primary and secondary sources. As a sample size, 80 households of the local community were selected by means of simple random sampling. Field visit and observation, household survey, key informants’ interview and focused group discussion were undertaken as data collection tools and techniques. And, tabulation and charts were used to analyze quantitative data. Findings show that anti-social activities like prostitution, gambling, theft, alcoholism and crime; adverse economic impact like price hike on daily commodities, unhealthy competition at work places and unemployment problem; and environmental problems like deforestation, soil erosion and pollutions increased remarkably after the arrival of the refugees in the camp, and their involvement in such issues is noted. However, as to mention positive aspects, the refugee community has provided the easily available labor/work force at low cost. Also, the refugee arrival has indirectly contributed to market expansion, road construction and school establishment in the local community. Thus, it can be concluded that the settlement of the refugees has both positive and negative socio-economic impacts on the local community. However, the negative impacts are a bit more than the positive ones. The UN agencies and CBOs can be recommended to work on the mitigation measures regarding the negative impacts. The UN and the GoN need to address the repatriation call raised by a group of the refugees to avert potential untoward incidents. The community area can still be a suitable study site for future researchers as new socio-economic impacts are likely to arise following the departure of all refugees from the camp.