For the second time in just seven months, West Bengal is witnessing a mass exodus of Bangladeshis who have been living in India after having crossed the border illegally. The first flight of the illegal immigrants took place in November 2025, when the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls was announced in West Bengal, months ahead of the Assembly election.

The latest rush to the border was precipitated by the newly elected BJP government’s announcement of the establishment of “holding centres” across the State to house undocumented migrants pending deportation. Staying true to its election promise to “detect, delete, and deport” illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, the West Bengal government on May 23—just two weeks after being sworn in—issued an order to set up holding centres in all 23 districts for “apprehended foreigners as well as for the released foreign prisoners awaiting deportation/repatriation in accordance with the MHA [Ministry of Home Affairs] guidelines”.

The first two holding centres were set up on May 24 in the Muslim-majority districts of Malda and Murshidabad that share a border with Bangladesh; and nine more have been established in less than a week. According to reports, as of May 29, more than 380 Bangladeshi nationals were housed in these centres. They are being allowed to enter Bangladesh after their national identity has been verified.

While the BJP’s ascent to power in the State had caused unease among Bangladeshis who stayed back through the SIR exercise, the announcement of the “holding centres” sent them into a panic. Numbers began to swell rapidly at the Hakimpur checkpost in the Bengal-Bangladesh border in North 24 Parganas. Indigent settlers, who had come to India in the hope of a better life, left their homes and dreams behind in a hurry, carrying with them only the most necessary items, including their Bangladeshi citizenship papers.

Driven by extreme poverty, practically all of them had crossed over to India in the hope of earning a living. Some were living here for a few years, others for decades. Life was hardly a bed of roses in India, where they could only eke out a living as labourers, cleaners, and domestic helpers, yet they believed it was better than what they would be go back to in their own country. Most of them have paid large amounts—as much as Rs.20,000 or even Rs.30,000—to middlemen to get across the border.

While some illegal immigrants maintain that they never had any Indian identity card like Aadhaar or PAN, did not benefit from government welfare schemes, and did not vote, there are others who admit that they had all the necessary documents required for an Indian citizen and even voted in past elections.

At the Hakimpur border, Mafuza Khatoun was waiting for her documents to be vetted so that she could cross the border into Bangladesh. She said she had spent most of her life in West Bengal though she was originally from Khulna district in Bangladesh. “I have Aadhaar card, ration card, all the documents required in this country... I was getting Lakshmir Bhandar [the monthly allowance of Rs.1,500 that the Trinamool Congress government gave to women from economically backward backgrounds] until recently, and all the benefits and welfare schemes that were available; I voted three times in the elections here.”

She claimed her children were born in West Bengal and studied in government schools. Mafuza, like many other illegal immigrants, claimed that all her documents were provided by local Trinamool Congress members.

Ali Munshi said that Trinamool workers in his neighbourhood told him and his father that they would provide them with all the documents. In return, they would be expected to vote for the Trinamool. “They [Trinamool workers] said, since you are now one of us, we will look after you, and you will have to vote for us. Now that the government has changed and the BJP has come, we are afraid. So, instead of living in fear, we decided to go back to Bangladesh,” said Ali.

Discomfiture for Trinamool Congress

Most agreed that they would not have to leave if the Trinamool remained in power. “The new BJP government has made it clear that there is no place for us here. Things would have been different if the old Trinamool government was in power; we would not have to leave everything and go,” said a Bangladeshi who had been living in Kolkata for the past six years.

The claims of some of these migrants that they were helped by the previous Trinamool regime has served to strengthen the BJP’s allegation that former Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and her party were using illegal immigrants as a captive “vote bank”.

An oft-repeated election promise of the BJP was that, if it came to power, it would identify and apprehend illegal immigrants and “Rohingyas” from Bangladesh and deport them. One of the first decisions of the new government was to begin a State-wide crackdown on illegal immigrants.

“Run quickly, or the government will do what needs to be done,” was Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari’s warning to Bangladeshi settlers. “There is no need to send Bangladeshi infiltrators to court. We have a provision in the law that allows the police to directly hand them over to the Border Security Force [BSF], who in turn will ascertain whether the person handed over is a Bangladeshi or not... Why should we keep them in jail for three months or six months, or even two years, and provide them with your rice, dal, oil, fish, eggs, medicines? Are they our sons-in-law?” he demanded.

Attacking the previous government, Adhikari said that the Trinamool had turned a blind eye to the matter even though there were existing laws to deport Bangladeshis. “Some people did not use [the laws] for the sake of vote-bank interests. We are implementing the laws in the interest of the country and the State,” said Adhikari.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah also urged Bangladeshi immigrants to leave voluntarily to avoid state action. “Bengal government has made detention centres. But we want all those who had entered illegally to go back voluntarily. If they do, the State government will not file any case against them; and instead, it will help them to get back to their own country,” said Shah at a public rally in Gandhinagar on May 28.

What if genuine Indian citizens get targeted?

Not everyone is comfortable about the holding centres. It is feared that this frenzied process of tracking down foreigners will end up targeting genuine Indian citizens whose names have been deleted during the SIR exercise because of “logical discrepancy”. What if such people are labelled Bangladeshis and put in the holding centres?

Asif Faruk, general secretary of Migrant Labourer Unity Forum, an organisation that assists migrants in times of distress, said: “The state needs to ensure that no genuine citizen is harassed. We have seen how migrant workers from West Bengal, who are Indian citizens, were labelled Bangladeshis simply for being Bengali-speaking Muslims and pushed into Bangladesh. Even now, there are at least four migrant workers from West Bengal, all Indian citizens, who are still stranded in Bangladesh, after being forced across the border by the BSF.”

“With anti-Muslim emotions running high in the country and in post-BJP Bengal, both paperless immigrants and innocents are likely to get caught.”

The main opposition party, the Trinamool Congress, made no bones about its reservations regarding the holding centres. Addressing a press conference, party spokesperson and MLA Kunal Ghosh said, “We are staunchly against such detention camps. If any Bangladeshi infiltrator had entered Bengal, then the primary responsibility lies with the BSF, which is under the Central government… the government should follow the existing process—arrest the infiltrator, produce him in court, the court then sends him to jail; and from there he is pushed back into Bangladesh… There is also the danger of people falling prey to vindictive politics and falsely being put in these centres. First let the issue of legitimate voters be resolved.”

The Congress voiced the same concern. While maintaining that no illegal immigrant should be allowed to stay, it warned that innocent people should not be harassed.

Senior Congress leader Amitava Chakraborty told Frontline, “While there is no argument against illegal infiltrators being removed, those people whose names have been deleted in the SIR should not summarily be put into these camps. The Election Commission cannot decide citizenship; it is the Home Ministry’s job. If a person is targeted only for being a Muslim and labelled a Bangladeshi, the Congress will not stand for it.”

Ultimately, that is the danger. With anti-Muslim emotions running high in the country and in post-BJP Bengal, both paperless immigrants and innocents are likely to get caught.

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