In the last two months, as many as 445 Bangladeshi nationals returned from India after the Indian government published the National Register of Citizen (NRC) as per Bangladeshi Paramilitary Forces Chief.
Border Guard Bangladesh (BGP) Director General Maj Gen MD Shafeenul Islam on January 2 revealed the figures at a press briefing in Dhaka.
“About 1,000 people were arrested in 2019 for illegal border crossings from India to Bangladesh, with 445 of them returning home in November and December,” the general said.
After they were identified through local representatives, the paramilitary force (BGP) came to know that all the intruders were Bangladeshis. Around 253 cases were lodged against them for illegal trespassing. An initial investigation found that three of the repatriated were human traffickers.
However, BGP director clarified that trespassing did not cause any border tension between the two countries.
The BGP director in his visit to India last week had said that the introduction of NRC is entirely India’s “internal affair” and relation between both the country’s guarding forces are on good terms.
He also said that BGP will continue its work of preventing illegal border crossings as per its mandate. The bilateral visit for five days took between BGB delegates and Border Security Force (BSF) in Delhi between December 26-29.
The BGP delegation, which was headed by Islam asked BSF to take adequate steps to prevent killings of Bangladeshis on frontiers as the casualty figures spiked in 2019.
He said that there were 35 unexpected deaths last year. He also added that the BSF estimates the casualty figure much lower than what they have calculated.
He also said that Indian forces are following the policy of maintaining maximum restraint along with minimal use of force even after being attacked by armed offenders.
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