The Indian government has been accused of unlawfully deporting thousands of Indian Muslims to Bangladesh, prompting fears of an escalating campaign of persecution against Muslim minorities.
According to human rights organisations, Indian police across multiple states have detained and summarily deported thousands of people suspected of being illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, often bypassing due legal process. Many were forced across the border into Muslim-majority Bangladesh under threat of violence, reports The Guardian.
Lawyers and deportees told investigators that Indian citizens were among those expelled. Some who resisted were threatened at gunpoint by India’s Border Security Force (BSF), while approximately 200 deportees were later returned to India by Bangladeshi border guards after proving their Indian citizenship. “Instead of following legal procedure, India is pushing mainly Muslims and low-income communities into Bangladesh without any consent,” said Taskin Fahmina, senior researcher at Bangladesh-based rights organisation Odhikar. “This practice is a clear violation of both national and international law.”
Bangladesh’s Foreign Ministry said it had lodged multiple formal protests with Indian authorities, urging them to stop deporting people without proper vetting or prior consultation, but had received no response. One deportee, 62-year-old Hazera Khatun, was picked up by police on 25 May and driven overnight to the border with 14 others. Khatun, who is disabled and claims her family has lived in India for generations, was forced at gunpoint to cross into Bangladesh despite her protests. “We told them we were Indian, but they threatened to shoot us,” she said. “After hearing gunshots, we quickly walked across the border.”
Khatun and the others were initially detained by Bangladesh’s border guards, then sent back to India on foot. Upon returning home on 31 May, Khatun was traumatised and covered in bruises, according to her family. The deportations follow months of crackdowns under the Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which for over a decade has been accused of anti-Muslim policies. Recent deportations surged after an April attack in Kashmir left 25 Hindu tourists and a guide dead. The BJP government vowed to expel so-called “outsiders,” intensifying its efforts in Assam and other states.
In Assam, the BJP-run state government has long targeted Muslims through “foreigners tribunals,” where they must prove their citizenship. About 100 detainees are reportedly missing. Assam’s Chief Minister, Himanta Sarma, vowed to “intensify and expedite” deportations. Elsewhere, scores of Muslims across Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, and Delhi have been picked up by police and pushed across the border. In Gujarat alone, over 6,500 suspected “Bangladeshis” were detained recently, though only 450 were found to lack legal status.
Bangladesh’s Border Guard Director General Maj Gen Mohammad Ashrafuzzaman Siddiqui called the Indian pushbacks “a deviation from humane governance.” “Abandoning people in forests, forcing women and children into rivers, or dumping stateless refugees at sea is against all principles of human rights,” he said. With reports of deportees stuck in Bangladesh — including Maleka Begam, 67, an infirm woman separated from her family — fears grow that the crisis will worsen without urgent diplomatic intervention.