Bargaining (in)visibility: Rohingya refugees and the politics of visibility in India

Abstract

Abstract Despite relatively low numbers, Rohingya refugees in India have faced a spiralling, multi-factorial crisis of negative visibility over the past decade, constructed by public opinion, politicians, and media coverage. This paper examines this process of negative visibility, largely outside of the community’s control, its very real consequences, and in response, how refugees navigate within an increasingly hostile policy landscape. Relying on qualitative data collected with refugees, community leaders, and NGOs in Delhi, Jaipur, and Hyderabad (2022–23), we make three interrelated arguments. First, the visibility of the Rohingya as ‘illegal immigrants’ is driven by multiple spatial and episodic factors and actors embedded in India’s fragmented refugee governance. Second, refugees seem to adopt strategic mobilities/immobilities and pursue visibility in both mediated and coerced ways to protect themselves against the risks of negative visibility. Third, these strategies have unintended consequences for reassertion of hierarchical power relations within the community and with state authorities. Empirical evidence from the Rohingya case in India contributes to growing scholarly discussion on the co-constitutive politics of (in)visibility, (im)mobility, and fragmented refugee governance in South Asia.