The Bangladesh police have detained an Indian tea farmer allegedly abducted from West Bengal, and are now planning to file a case against him.
Identified as Dipankar Gope, the 35-year-old was handed over to the Panchagarh Police Station by Border Security Bangladesh (BGB).
“Process is underway to file a case against him. After the case is filed, he will be produced before a court and further action will be taken as per the court's order,” Ashis Kumar Shil, inspector (investigation) at the Panchagarh Police Station, told The Daily Star.
This comes after locals detained Dipankar at a sugarcane field near Border Pillar 742/12 along the Birajot border, claiming that he had crossed over from West Bengal into Bangladesh.
However, Indian reports claim that Dipankar had not crossed over into Bangladesh, but was abducted by at least 15 Bangladeshi nationals as an act of revenge.
The abduction reportedly took place on Saturday morning, when he had been spraying pesticides—all by himself—at his tea field in the Kukurjan area of West Bengal's Jalpaiguri district, which falls under the jurisdiction of the Border Security Force's Chaulhati outpost.
At least 15 Bangladeshi nationals reportedly crossed into the Indian border, located about 140m away from his field, and forcibly took him with them.
Following the abduction, BSF personnel rushed to the spot and initiated efforts to secure Gope's release. They even held a flag meeting with BGB officials, but to no avail.
In the meantime, a video purportedly showing Gope has also surfaced, in which the Bangladeshi locals detaining him say that he would only be released if Tamiz Uddin was freed. THE WEEK could not independently verify this video.
Tamiz is the Bangladeshi national arrested by the BSF earlier this week for allegedly trying to cross into India from Bangladesh by cutting the barbed wire at the Choulhati border itself.
However, Bangladeshi locals have claimed that Tamiz, said to be in his seventies, had only been looking for his missing cow when he was detained.
The detention of Dipankar has sparked alarm among people living alongside the border, with the BSF in constant contact with the BGB to secure his safe release.
The finer details of both sides of the case are also being probed.
