India: Turning the Bangladeshi border into a political issue

Bangladeshis illegally crossing the border into India has become an increasingly fraught political issue. But experts warn that it is being politicized for electoral gain.

Although people have always crossed from Bangladesh into India, the issue has become a much more central topic since Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power in 2014.

It was the BJP that initiated a new Indian Citizenship Amendment Act in 2019, according to which Hindu migrants are given the status of refugees. Muslims, on the other hand, are either pu

nished or sent back to Bangladesh or other neighboring countries.

BJP leaders also played up the

crossings as a key issue during recent local elections.

According to statistics from the the Indian Border Security

Force (BSF) and National Crime Record Bureau, 1,115 Bangladeshis were taken into custody near the border for lacking proper permits during 2020, up to mid-December. In the same period, 3,173 people were arrested for attempting to illegally cross the border from India into Bangladesh.

The two South Asian neighbors share a 4,096-kilometer (2,545-mile) border. The line runs through five Indian states: West Bengal, Assam, Tripura, Meghalaya and Mizoram. According to local media, the BSF has identified half of the border as vulnerable to crossings either due to the lack of fencing or

bodies of water.

The economic pull factor

"You don't need any data to know that many Bangladeshis work in India," an expert on Indo-Bangladeshi refugee policy Suchandra Ghatak told DW.

"But this context can't be seen politically: It is rather the

Bangladesh has denied that its citizens cross the border into India for economic reasons

Large sections of the long Indo-Bangladeshi border are very difficult to monitor