Close on the heels of 21 Bangladeshi nationals being deported on January 19 this year, another batch of 20 Bangladeshis would be deported from Assam on May 4.
Out of the 20 Bangladeshi nationals, 19 are lodged in Silchar Central Jail and a woman was lodged in Kokrajhar Central Jail.
All of them will be sent back once again through Karimganj border of Sutarkandi to Bangladesh.
Out of the 19 inmates lodged in Silchar Central Jail, 11 are from Sylhet. They are – Shekhar Namasudra, Ikbal Hussain Talukdar, Ahmed Uddin, Md Ishak Ali, Md Azim Uddin, Sujit Chandra Das, Samir Ahmed, Abdul Gafur, Chand Ali, Alim Uddin alias Badal Miya alias Badal Biswas and Abdul Latif.
Also read: Amidst Citizenship Bill imbroglio, 21 Muslims deported to Bangladesh
Three of the detainees are residents of Kishoreganj. They are – Rabindra Das, Digendra Chandra Das and Shah Ali Mia.
The five others are – Md Ibrahim alias Ibrahim Talukdar and Faruk Mia, who are from Moulvi Bazaar; Sayed Al Amin, who is from Habiganj; Rabiul Sardar is from Gopalganj and Parimal Jaldas is from Coxbazaar.
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The lone female to be deported is Alo Rani Das, who has been brought from Kokrajhar Central Jail and is now in Silchar’s Central Jail.
The secretary general of Silchar-based Citizen’s Rights Presentation Committee of Assam, which has been working on deportation of Bangladesh nationals lodged in jails, Sadhan Purkayastha told Northeast Now, “I knew it coming more than a month back, but was requested by Assistant High Commissioner based at Guwahati, Shah Mohammad Tanvir Mansoor, not to speak much on it, as Muslim fundamentalists, based in Bangladesh, take such a deportation move with a pinch of salt and create more ruckus back home.”
“These groups make it an issue out there, thus creating more trouble between the bonhomie of Hasina-Modi governments that has been in place for quite some time now,” he added.
“These 19 inmates who are now being readied to be deported on May 4 were in the pipeline to be sent back to Bangladesh long before general elections in our country. It would have a regressive effect, believed High Commission of Bangladesh, for which, all such moves have been stalled,” informed Sadhan Purkayastha.
Purkayastha added, “Keeping any self-accepted inmate of being a Bangladeshi national, after he or she completes his or her jail term, is a burden on our exchequer. Nineteen more self-claimed Bangladeshi nationals are still lodged inside Silchar Central Jail, of which, five are yet to complete their ‘prison term’. Rest 42 illegal Bangladeshis are holed up here in the name of being in detention camp sent by Foreigners’ Tribunals, and the number is rising, thick and fast.”