Nine suspected Rohingyas detained near India-Bangladesh border in Assam's Cachar

    Silchar (Assam), Aug 13 (PTI) Nine suspected Rohingyas, including two women and five children, have been detained by Assam Police near the India-Bangladesh border in Cachar district, an officer said on Wednesday.
    Cachar Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Numal Mahatta said the detainees were picked up from Katigorah area on Tuesday evening following a tip-off from intelligence sources.
    "They have been staying in India for many years. Recently, they travelled here with the intention of living in this area. They did not attempt to cross the border, but our team intercepted them before they could settle here," Mahatta told reporters.
    Residents of Bishwanbharpur village in Katigorah area near the border, however, had earlier claimed that they had spotted a group of unfamiliar people in a market and after questioning them, handed them over to the police on Tuesday night.
    "They were speaking in a dialect similar to the Rohingya language. This is not the first time we have seen unfamiliar faces here," a local resident said.
    Similar incidents had been reported during the last year, leading to the detention and "pushback" of several illegal immigrants, he said.
    The detained persons claimed they had entered India illegally around 20 years ago and had worked in different states, including Jammu and Kashmir and Telangana.
    During interrogation, they said that they wanted to return to Bangladesh due to the recent crackdown on migrant workers and they had relatives there.
    They also claimed that some middlemen had promised to help them cross the border.
    The nine detained persons who claimed they were Rohingyas had travelled by train from Hyderabad and were taken by a middleman to a forest near the border where they stayed for the whole day without any food or water.
    It was in the evening that they came out of the forest in search of food when they were spotted by the locals.
    A case has been registered against the group and they will be deported as per the directions of higher authorities, Mahatta said.

(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)