SIR impact: How BSF is dealing with long queues of Bangladeshis wanting to return home from West Bengal

The Hakimpur BSF border outpost in West Bengal's North 24 Parganas, has become an informal departure corridor for "illegal Bangladeshis," who lived on the Indian side for years. According to reports, families are seen queuing up at the post, pleading the BSF jawans to let them pass and "go home."

Across the South Bengal border belt, security personnel and locals reportedly claim the number of undocumented Bangladeshi nationals wanting to return to their native lands has sharply increased since early November. Several officials link this “reverse migration” directly to the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls underway in West Bengal, news agency PTI said.

Many in the queue admit they procured Aadhaar cards, ration cards or voter IDs through touts and middlemen during their stay in West Bengal, PTI claimed. With SIR demanding verification of older documents, several said they preferred leaving rather than risking questioning and possible detention.

“If they check old papers, we cannot show anything. Better to leave before they ask questions,” the report quoted a Bangladesh national who lived in Kolkata for eight years as saying. The concern is echoed across the queue of men, women and families who arrived from areas such as New Town, Birati, Dhulagori, Bamangachi, Ghusuri and parts of Howrah's industrial belt.

A group of men from Satkhira said they paid between Rs 5,000 and Rs 7,000 to enter West Bengal earlier. Others spent significantly more. “I paid nearly Rs 20,000 to get documents,” said 29-year-old Manirul Sheikh, who worked in garment units in Dhulagori and collected scrap iron.

According to the BSF, 150–200 people a day are being detained and pushed back after verification. The queues began swelling from November 4, the day the SIR exercise began. Verification is mandatory. Biometric details are sent to district authorities and the state police. That takes time. Because of the volume, delays of two to three days are common. People wait outside the outpost gate on plastic sheets, newspapers or under halted trucks.

“We cannot assume everyone here is simply returning home,” a BSF officer said.

BSF personnel provide meals to those inside the camp, but people waiting outside depend on roadside stalls or occasional food distribution by local youth and shopkeepers.

The surge has, however, strained local policing.

“We had 95 detainees in two days. No station has the space or facilities to hold so many. We stopped taking custody after that,” an officer reportedly told the news agency.

Officials said around 1,200 people have returned to Bangladesh after undergoing official procedures in the past six days. Nearly 60 people were still waiting on Saturday. As the sun dipped behind the barbed fence, a BSF jawan watched the line snake down the mud road.

“They came in the dark,” he said, referring to years of night crossings. “Now they leave in daylight, through the proper channel. That is the difference.”