112 illegal Bangladeshis deported from Mumbai region; total this year jumps to 719

The documents show that the illegal immigrants were detained from across the city between June 12 and August 5. While 92 of them were from Mumbai — 40 women, 34 children and 18 men — the breakup of the 20 who were detained and deported from Mira Bhayander and Thane was not available.

“This time the government decided to drop the illegal immigrants at the Assam-Bangladesh border, which is highly secured and manned by the Indian Army and it is next to impossible to enter through the border there. They were handed over to the Bangladesh border security force,” a police officer said.

Another officer on condition of anonymity said, “From January 1 till August 5 this year, the Mumbai police have deported 719 Bangladeshi nationals staying illegally in the city.”

The deported Bangladeshi nationals were detained by various police stations across the city and most of them were detained in the last week of July after they were ascertained to have violated visa norms and entered India illegally via the Indo-Bangladesh international border.

A senior IPS officer said, “They were deported to Bangladesh under Section 3 (2) (c) of the Foreigners Act 1946 after completing the required legal process.”

The deportation started in February this year when the first lot of 12 people were sent back across the border. The crackdown on illegal Bangladeshi nationals gained momentum after the arrest of Shariful Islam, a Bangladeshi national who allegedly attacked Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan inside his Bandra residence on January 16. Shariful was found to have a duplicate Aadhaar card with his photo and an Indian SIM card, which he allegedly procured illegally in India.

Describing the details of the operation, a senior police officer said once their informants tipped them off about suspicious people at building construction sites across the city, they were called to the police station. Following this, police collected evidence — call data records (to check if they had made international calls regularly to Bangladesh) or bank transactions — and then they were detained for legal procedure.

The documents show that out of the 92 deported from Mumbai, the highest number were from Andheri’s Amboli area, from where a total of 11 were apprehended. The data further showed that in at least four cases only the mother was found to be staying with her minor kids illegally.