Between 1,000 and 2,000 people have been “pushed in” from India to Bangladesh through various border areas over the past month. Bangladesh shares its longest land boundary with India -- over 4,096 kilometres -- the fifth-longest land border in the world. It is not humanly possible for our border forces to guard every terrain at all times to prevent such extrajudicial deportations -- especially when many of those pushed in are not even of Bangladeshi origin in the first place.
At a press briefing in New Delhi late last month, Indian External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said unequivocally that the deportation of overstaying or illegally residing foreigners in India would be carried out following due process of law. He mentioned that 2,369 individuals of Bangladeshi origin were staying in India and that his country had requested Bangladesh to take them back once the verification process was completed.
However, in reality, it is shocking to see Bangladesh’s immediate neighbour literally picking people up in the dead of night, herding them to border points -- particularly in areas where surveillance is weak -- and then forcibly pushing them into Bangladesh. This has been ongoing since early last month, with no pause even during last week’s Eid celebrations, despite Bangladesh’s repeated calls for adherence to legal procedures in deporting individuals.
As time passes and India’s “push-in” spree continues unabated, disturbing details are emerging from across the border. Social media is flooded with accounts of Indian security forces detaining Bengali-speaking individuals -- some even Assamese-speaking -- particularly Muslims, from various parts of Assam, herding them to zero points or no man’s land along the Bangladesh-India border, and forcibly pushing them into Bangladesh.
This is no longer a case of only Bangladesh protesting India’s actions of pushing people across the border without following international norms. Voices from within India are now questioning how a country that prides itself on being a democracy can attempt to deport its own citizens to a neighbouring country.
Evidence of Indian law enforcement picking up their own citizens in the dead of night and pushing them towards Bangladesh has started to surface in a few independent Indian media outlets. In one such instance, an elderly woman named Rahima Begum was forcibly taken by police from Assam’s Golaghat district, tortured, and pushed into no man’s land.
She gave a harrowing account of her ordeal: Indian security forces, in an attempt to push her into Bangladesh, handed her a few Bangladeshi taka and made her stand in a paddy field filled with knee-deep water and mud for hours. Thirsty, she drank water from the muddy field. She was beaten, and locals there chased her along with others stranded by security forces. Later, she was taken back by security personnel, forced to return the Bangladeshi money, and brought to Kokrajhar, another town in Assam. She said she had no idea why she was subjected to such torture when she possessed valid documents proving her Indian citizenship.
Her husband later told Indian media that on the night Rahima was taken, two of their daughters were present, but the family was given no information about her whereabouts that night or throughout the following day.
Civil liberty groups from Mumbai to Guwahati are pleading for justice and have written twice in one week to the Indian National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), seeking information about the whereabouts of at least 145 people in Assam who have gone missing amid recent mass night-time raids and extralegal deportations by Indian authorities.
In an urgent memorandum to the NHRC, Mumbai-based human rights organization Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP), along with the Forum for Social Harmony and its Assam legal team, appealed to the apex rights body to intervene in what they described as an “unprecedented human rights emergency” in Assam.
On May 31, 2025, CJP submitted a detailed, evidence-backed memorandum alleging that, between May 23 and May 31, at least 300 individuals -- mostly Bengali-speaking Muslims -- were secretly detained without arrest memos or warrants, and approximately 145 have since “disappeared” under highly suspicious and unlawful circumstances.
According to the memorandum, this entire operation by the Assam Border Police has been shrouded in secrecy and carried out with blatant disregard for constitutional protections, legal procedures, and even ongoing court cases. The most chilling claim: Many of those missing may have been forcibly pushed across the Indo-Bangladesh border -- a move amounting to extralegal expulsion and, potentially, statelessness.
The CJP memorandum presents a grim chronology. From May 23 onward, night raids by Assam’s Border Police reportedly swept across 33 districts, detaining individuals from their homes without warrants, memos, or explanations -- tantamount to abduction. No legal counsel was allowed, and families were left in the dark regarding their loved ones’ whereabouts or safety.
While approximately 150 detainees were later released, at least 145 remain untraceable -- many suspected to have been dumped in “no man’s land” between India and Bangladesh.
CJP highlights one particularly egregious case: Khairul Islam, a retired government school teacher from Morigaon, Assam. Despite having an active petition in the Supreme Court, he was picked up by police on May 23. Days later, he appeared in a video from Bangladesh’s Kurigram district, confirming that he had been forcibly pushed in. Subsequent reports on June 1 indicated that Khairul Islam was among those fortunate enough to be brought back to India. CJP warns that such actions violate India’s international legal obligations.
In a supplementary memorandum submitted to the NHRC on June 4, CJP presented new evidence of what it called a systematic campaign of detentions and cross-border expulsions of Bengali-speaking Muslims from Assam without following due legal process.
Based on more than a dozen first-hand testimonies and verified field reports, the memorandum alleged that Assam Police and border security forces forcibly deported individuals -- including elderly women, children, the chronically ill, and those with legal protection -- without any lawful procedure or judicial sanction.
The memorandum includes at least six testimonies from women aged between 35 and 65 who were picked up from their homes, held incommunicado, stripped of their identity papers, and forcibly pushed into Bangladeshi territory by Indian authorities between May 25 and May 30, 2025. These testimonies were collected by CJP’s ground team in Assam during the first week of June.
It is now incumbent upon the NHRC and the Indian government to take these grave violations and extralegal deportations seriously -- and to provide redress not just for Bangladesh’s sake, but for the sake of India’s own citizens, who are being made victims of this precarious situation.
Reaz Ahmad is Editor, Dhaka Tribune.
