Border Security Force personnel patrol along the India-Bangladesh border. File.
| Photo Credit: PTI
The number of undocumented migrants — suspected to be from Bangladesh — apprehended by the Border Security Force (BSF) while attempting to voluntarily leave India through the eastern border this year was over three times higher than in 2024, government data show.
In 2024, as many as 1,049 undocumented people were apprehended while leaving the country while till July 15 this year, 3,536 undocumented people were caught by the BSF, a senior government official said. The number of people who were stopped when they tried to enter the country from Bangladesh last year stood at 2,425, while till July 15 this year, the number was 1,372.
The official said that post the political changes in neighbouring Bangladesh on August 5, 2024, there has been a surge in the number of undocumented migrants exiting the country voluntarily.
The voluntary exits are different from the “pushback” drive against alleged illegal migrants being pursued by police across the country on the directions of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) after the Pahalgam terror attack on April 22.
After the regime change in Bangladesh last year, the MHA asked police to detect and deport Bangladeshis who had illegally entered the country and were living here on forged documents. The drive assumed momentum after the Pahalgam terror attack and the MHA asked States to deport the undocumented migrants but in most cases “pushback” is happening, the latter not defined under law. According to various estimates, around 2,500 people, thought to be from Bangladesh have been “pushed back” across the eastern border.
Rajya Sabha member Samirul Islam, from the Trinamool Congress, said that at least seven people from West Bengal who were “illegally pushed into Bangladesh by the BSF” have been brought back because of the State government’s efforts and after the families filed habeas corpus petitions in the Calcutta High Court. The BSF has denied the “pushback”.
A senior BSF official said that the force, deployed along the 4,096-km border with Bangladesh has been on a heightened vigil since August 2024, with instructions from the MHA “to not allow anyone into the country without valid documents”.
“Undocumented migrants leaving the country voluntarily is not a new trend. In the past also, we have caught both Indians and Bangladeshis crossing the border illegally. Post August 2024, however there has been a sharp increase in the number of such people leaving India. If they are not involved in a serious crime, we let them go as keeping them here entails registration of a long legal procedure,” the BSF official said.
Since 2018, as many as 17,637 Bangladeshi nationals were intercepted by the BSF along the eastern border while 3,342 individuals were caught in 2023.
Published – August 13, 2025 10:42 pm IST