India has forcibly deported over 2,500 alleged Bangladeshi nationals since early May in an intensified nationwide campaign, raising concerns about violations of human rights, legal procedures and international norms.
The campaign, launched on 7 May, involves mass detention of suspected illegal immigrants across several states, including Delhi, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Assam and Rajasthan, followed by their transfer to border states such as Assam, Tripura, and Meghalaya, The Indian Express reported.
There, they are handed over to the Border Security Force and “pushed back” into Bangladesh. In a striking shift from earlier, the detainees are reportedly transported to the border in air force aircraft.
Authorities claim the crackdown is driven by national security concerns sparked in particular by a terror attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir, on 22 April left 26 civilians dead and led to a military conflict with Pakistan.
Assam chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma claimed the northeastern state had detained almost 1,000 alleged Bangladeshis in recent months and expelled 303, IANS news agency reported.
A digital identification system has become key to the deportation campaign. The Foreigners Identification Portal – originally designed in 2018 to track Rohingya refugees from Myanmar – has been expanded to store biometric and demographic data of suspected migrants from Bangladesh, according to The Indian Express.
State governments, union territories, and the foreign ministry now have access to the portal, enabling deportation when identity can’t be verified. Additionally, applicants for national identity documents such as biometric-based Aadhaar card, voter IDs and ration cards are being screened against this database.
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The home ministry has given states a 30-day deadline to verify the status of suspected undocumented immigrants from Bangladesh and Myanmar. This drive is supported by a centralised server integrating data from border and immigration agencies.
The campaign is also targeting Rohingya refugees and convicted foreign nationals in detention facilities.
Mr Sarma said even individuals who had received temporary protection from deportation by India’s Supreme Court and various high courts had been expelled – though later re-admitted to India through diplomatic intervention.
The chief minister cited the Supreme Court ruling upholding Section 6A of the 1955 Citizenship Act to justify bypassing Foreigners Tribunals, a quasi-judicial process for determining citizenship.
Section 6A allows those who entered Assam between 1966 and 1971 to apply for Indian citizenship, but it has long been opposed by Assamese groups who argue it legitimises migration from Bangladesh.
State authorities refer a person suspected to be a foreigner to a tribunal, which looks at documentary evidence to decide whether the person is Indian or not. The efficacy of the system has been criticised, however.
In an egregious case, a tribunal declared Assam resident Rahim Ali a foreigner, forcing him to wage a 12-year legal fight to prove his citizenship. By the time he was recognised as an Indian citizen by the Supreme Court, Ali had died. Delivering its ruling in July last year, the court called the tribunal’s order a “grave miscarriage of justice”.
Bangladesh has formally protested the deportations.
On 8 May, Dhaka lodged a diplomatic complaint with India and foreign affairs adviser Md Touhid Hossain confirmed that another protest note was forthcoming.
“We see it’s happening. It’s not feasible to resist physically,” Mr Hossain said. He urged both countries to resolve the issue through legal and diplomatic channels.
Despite India’s assertion that migration from Bangladesh was rising, Bangladesh’s Border Guard previously said that such flows had declined due to economic gains in their country.
In 2020-21, Bangladesh’s per capita income briefly surpassed India’s, complicating the narrative of economic desperation as a primary driver of migration.
Still, Indian officials continue to press for faster nationality verification from Bangladesh. Foreign ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said over 2,360 people were awaiting deportation pending confirmation of their Bangladeshi citizenship, with some cases stalled since 2020.
In the capital Delhi, police have arrested 66 alleged Bangladeshi immigrants, PTI news agency reported, quoting officials.
The expulsion campaign has sparked condemnation from rights groups as many of the deported people claim to be Indian nationals wrongfully identified as Bangladeshis.
Khairul Islam, 51, a former government schoolteacher in Assam’s Morigaon, is one of them. He was picked up from his home by Assam police on 23 May and thrown across the border four days later.
In a video posted by a Bangladeshi journalist, Mr Islam was seen standing in a field between Assam and Bangladesh’s Kurigram district. “My hands were tied like I was a thief and I was made to sit in the bus,” he said, recounting his ordeal.
Mr Islam had been declared a foreigner by a tribunal in 2016, a decision upheld by the Gauhati High Court in 2018. He spent two years in a detention centre before being released on bail. His appeal to the Supreme Court is still pending.
After being stranded in no man’s land between the two countries for two days, he was taken to a camp run by Bangladesh’s Border Guard. A few days later, the group was escorted to the Indian border, where he was taken into police custody again and finally released on Thursday.
“I am an Indian, so why would I go to Bangladesh?” Mr Islam said, adding that he was beaten at the Matia Detention Centre when he resisted deportation. His family had submitted documents proving his Indian citizenship to local authorities but to no avail.
“This is injustice and there will be judgement for this one day,” Mr Islam was quoted as saying by the Indian news outlet Scroll. “We are not Bangladeshi. We are swadesi [native-born]. They should check and verify this before doing such acts.”
Human rights campaigners, academics and lawyers have condemned the deportation of people to Bangladesh, calling it a violation of protections granted by the Indian constitution and the right to due process.
Demanding an end to all “pushbacks”, 125 academics and activists called on the Indian government to “allow the return of those citizens who have already been forcibly deported to Bangladesh”.
“This is not just a legal failure,” they said in a statement, “it is a humanitarian crisis that strikes at the core of India’s constitutional democracy.”
The concern followed Indian media reports that at least 40 Rohingya refugees had been flown from Delhi to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, then allegedly abandoned in the sea off southeastern Myanmar, handcuffed and blindfolded.
Bangladeshi media reported that some 300 individuals, including Rohingyas, were forced back into the country from India between 7 and 9 May, often through isolated and remote border points.
