India repeatedly forced 14 members of Bengali Muslim family from Odisha into Bangladesh, says kin

A family of 14 men, women and children – all Bengali Muslims from Odisha’s Jagatsinghpur district – were allegedly forced into Bangladesh by the Border Security Force in December, a relative told Scroll. This was confirmed by Bangladesh border officials, who detained them in the no man’s land between the two countries.

The 14 people, belonging to one family, had been living in Odisha for over seven decades, their relative Saiful Ali Khan said. The eldest among them is a 90-year-old woman.

Their native village is in West Bengal’s South 24 Parganas district, according to a gram panchayat certificate that is in the family’s possession.

Two months ago, the family was detained in Jagatsinghpur on suspicion of being Bangladeshi citizens, Khan said. Among them was Khan’s 36-year-old niece Sabera Bibi.

On December 26, the 14 members were forced into Bangladesh by the Border Security Force, Khan told Scroll.

The Border Guard Bangladesh detained them on the same night in Chuadanga district, which shares a boundary with Nadia district in Bengal.

Bangladeshi authorities told news outlets in the country that the 14 were formally sent back to India on December 28.

Mehdi Hasan, the officer in charge of Darshana police station, confirmed the incident to Scroll, saying that the group of 14 old people, women and children were handed over to the Border Guard Bangladesh which later sent them to India.

“They had come from Odisha and were later sent to India,” Hasan told Scroll.

But Khan told Scroll that the group was shunted back and forth between the two countries four times, as the border officials on either side refused to let them stay.

The BSF pushed them into Bangladesh three times, while the Bangladesh border officials expelled them from their territory once. Nine members of the family, Khan said, are still in hiding in Bangladesh. The whereabouts of five others are unknown.

In a video shot when they were in the custody of Border Guard Bangladesh, one of the 14 is heard saying that BSF officials threatened to open fire on them if they tried to return to India.

Scroll sent an email to the Border Security Force spokesperson asking about the repeated expulsions of the family. The story will be updated if they respond.

The superintendent of police of Odisha’s Jagatsinghpur, Ankit Kumar Verma, told Scroll that a statewide drive against “Bangladeshi infiltrators” is underway but refused to divulge more. “I can’t verify like this,” he said. “These are all confidential and secret things. I can’t share anything related to this.”

Last year, Scroll had reported on how Bengali migrant workers had been detained in several states ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party, including Odisha, and asked to prove they were Indian citizens.

The drives by the police ended up throwing several Indian citizens across the border, without giving them time or opportunity to prove their citizenship – in violation of the Centre’s own rules.

Last month, a heavily pregnant woman, Sunali Khatun, and her eight-year-old son Sabir were brought back to India from Bangladesh on the direction of the Calcutta High Court and, later, the Supreme Court.

Khatun, her child and her husband had been picked up from Delhi and “pushed” into Bangladesh, despite the fact that the family had land records in Bengal, going back five generations.

‘If you come back, we will open fire’

The family detained from Odisha is originally from South 24 Parganas district, Khan said.

Among the members of the family expelled include 90-year-old Guljan Bibi, her daughter and son-in-law, four grandsons and three granddaughters-in-law and four great-grandchildren.

Khan’s niece, Sabera Bibi, is married to Bibi’s grandson Sheikh Ukil.

The family had been living in Berhampur village under Balikuda Tehsil of Odisha’s Jagatsinghpur district for the last seven decades, Khan, who lives in the same district, told Scroll.

“Two months ago, the police came, demolished their homes and arrested them as they were speaking Bangla,” he said.

According to Khan, the family was detained for one month and five days, despite showing the Odisha police their identity documents, including voter and Aadhaar cards.

On December 17, the pradhan of West Bengal’s Moushuni gram panchayat in South 24 Paragnas issued a certificate, declaring that Sheikh Hosen – Bibi’s husband – was a permanent resident of Baliara village of the district, but now lives with his family at the Berhampur village in Odisha.

“After over a month of detention, they were made to cross the India-Bangladesh border and pushed into Chuadanga in Bangladesh on December 26,” Khan said. “They walked about 4 km but were later detained by the Bangladeshi police and Border Guard Bangladesh at Darshana bus stand in Chuadanga.”

He said he got to know of the family’s plight when one of them called him on January 7, having borrowed a phone from someone in Bangladesh.

In a video filmed when the family was in the custody of Border Guard Bangladesh, Sabera Bibi’s husband, Sheikh Ukil, is heard telling the officials in Hindi: “We were first brought to Kolkata from Odisha and then to the border where we were made to roam for three days before being pushed into Bangladesh.”

Scroll accessed the 3.37 minute video, and asked Saiful Khan to confirm the identity of the speakers. He identified them as his relatives.

Ukil is heard recounting in Hindi how they came to be in Bangladesh. “We showed Aadhaar and voter cards to the BGB,” he said. “Then the BGB people took us to BSF and handed us over to BSF. The BSF provided us food and they again threw us here. The BSF told us if you come back, they will open fire. Where will we go?”