In-between borders: mapping belonging and citizenship in the Bengal Borderland

Recent academic discourses highlight borders as dynamic forces influencing life beyond territorial demarcations. This paper examines belonging and citizenship by looking at the case of Bengali-speaking Muslim women who married across the India-Bangladesh border. Initially, clandestine visits helped to sustain kinship ties, but increasing border enforcement and emphasis on documentation have resulted in regulated journeys with the help of passports. Building on the politics of belonging and translocational positionality framework, this paper emphasises the fluidity of their belonging, reflecting the border's nature, and addresses the ambivalence in navigating citizenship and belonging. Ethnographically looking at West Bengal's border villages, the paper analyses how the sense of belonging in a borderland is complex, ambivalent and shaped by personal experiences and not solely contingent upon the possession of legal-bureaucratic documentation. This study enriches discourses on borders and belonging by looking at the layers of negotiation in borderlands, challenging straightforward notions of belonging.