Bangladesh Migrants

Author: PK Mishra

Publisher: Gyan, Rs910

This is one such book that offers a veritable mine of information and analysis on the ground reality across India’s longest land border which the country shares with Bangladesh, says A SURYA PRAKASH

While there have been many books on the issue of migration of Bangladeshis into India and its implications for India’s social structure, internal security and electoral politics, we rarely get to see a book that provides us a rare insight into the complexities involved in managing the 4,097 km Indo-Bangladesh border, given the difficult terrain, the prevailing socio-economic conditions in villages on either side of the divide, hostile weather conditions for many months every year, and the corrupt nexus between smugglers and police.  

Bangladesh Migrants: A Threat to india by Pavas Kumar Mishra, retired Additional Director-General of the Border Security Force (BSF) and a Senior Fellow at the Vivekananda International Foundation, is one such book that offers a veritable mine of information and analysis on the ground reality across this long border. It also provides valuable suggestions to policy makers on measures to be taken to strengthen border management.

The significance of this book is that it is written by a person who has had hands-on experience for many decades in manning India’s sensitive borders both in the West and the East and who has often come face to face with illegal infiltration, cross-border terrorism and at times, the human problems associated with illegal migration by hordes of Bangladeshis who desperately seek safety, better jobs and a better life in India. As Mishra explains in the preface to the book, India’s longest land border is with Bangladesh and along this border, which has a complex topography, he has had to deal with migrants who come in hordes through land and riverine routes. He speaks of the large scale influx of agents belonging to Pakistan’s ISI, the worrying delay in fencing and lighting the border along the Tripura, Mizoram and the Khasi belt of Meghalaya; and the indifferent attitude of the people along the border towards the paramilitary forces like the BSF which is doing the thankless job of manning a porous and dangerous border.

This book is one of its kind because it is written by a senior police officer with a wealth of experience in border management and a deep and abiding commitment to India’s national interests. Mishra has the ability to traverse a vast ground — from the minutiae of the state of a particular stretch of the border fence to the macro issues of national unity and integrity that the unstoppable migration of Bangladeshis impinges upon. For example, the author says that there are 86 vulnerable border posts whose areas are prone to crossing and there are 115 gaps in the Indo-Bangladesh border fence! He then goes on to talk about the demographic changes that this infiltration has brought about in Assam and West Bengal, which is a warning bell for the entire country. Also, the rise of Muslim fundamentalist groups in Northeast India, particularly in Assam, Manipur and West Bengal, which will warrant higher allocations for border security, and the mushrooming of mosques and madrasas in the border districts of North 24 Parganas, Nadia, Mushirabad, Malda, West Dinajpur, Dhubri, Cachar and Karimganj, which will need security-vetting.

His border-management responsibilities took him all across the border and he gave himself the rare task of chronicling the situation in different regions. For example, he says he analysed the situation prevailing in Kokrajar, Manipur, Mizoram, Silchar, Tura, Khasi, Jaintia, Agartala border, Sundarbans, Islampur, Karimpur, etc. He travelled to many char islands in the Brahmaputra by boat and even had a tete-a-tete with the Bangladesh Police. He interviewed village headmen, doctors, tribals chiefs, advocates, social workers, Christian missionaries, land-owners in adverse possession cases and residents of Bangladesh enclaves in India. His work and desire to collect data also took him to all customs and excise posts and police stations along the border and border outposts of the BSF along the Indo-Bangladesh border, the Indo-Myanmar border and all through the Northeastern States. Mr Mishra also had the responsibility of border fencing and floodlighting work along the Indo-Bangladesh border in Assam, Meghalaya and Mizoram and even in some permanent char islands in the Brahmaputra.

After all this effort, the author has made a series of recommendations to arrest the influx of illegal migrants from Bangladesh. He says that all illegal migrants must be pushed back into Bangladesh at all cost; a new and imaginative plan to fence the border with Bangladesh is needed because of the impact of heavy rainfall on the fence and on floodlighting; strict measures must be taken to end the criminal-political nexus along the border; the gross misuse of the Public Distribution System along the border must end; the ambiguity in regard to jurisdiction among forces guarding the border must be sorted out; firm measures must be taken to end corruption and illegal migrants must be disenfranchised. What has made the situation even more problematic is the fact that a number of Bangladeshi nationals who have come into India with valid passports have dissolved into the great Indian population. Therefore, the problem is not confined only to illegal migrants. It extends to valid passport holders who come into India from Bangladesh ostensibly for valid like tourism, business etc and then do the disappearing act. .

Mishra has been a one-man commission on a silent investigation all though his career along the border and conscientiously collected facts. His grasp of the border problem is extraordinary as anyone who interacts with him will realise. Clearly, an unparalleled feat for a police officer. That is why this book is unique and of value to India’s policy makers, security experts and democracy and demography specialists.      

More recently, the country’s apex court has also warned the government of the direct consequences of illegal immigration into India. As Mr Prakash Singh, the former Director-General of BSF, points out in his foreword to this book, the Supreme Court said in this landmark judgement while repealing the IMDT Act, “There can be no doubt that the State of Assam is facing external aggression and internal disturbance on account of large-scale illegal migration of Bangladeshi nationals”. It directed the Union Government to “take all measures for protection of the State of Assam from such external aggression and internal disturbance as enjoined in Article 355 of the Constitution”. This was in July, 2005. Nine years have gone by, but there is little evidence on the ground to show that the Union Government has understood the apex court’s disturbing diagnosis. Needless to say, there is no evidence either to show that firm measures are in place to protect Assam from within and without.

This is the disturbing conclusion that Mishra arrives at too, after diligent field work. One only hopes that the recent regime change in New Delhi  will end the policy paralysis that has gripped the Union Government in areas of national security and that a new, robust policy will emerge to protect India’s national borders with the firmness and authority that national interest demands.

The reviewer is an author and political commentator