Behind a pair of inexperienced surgical curtains, 26-year-old Sunali Khatun struggles to sit down cross-legged. It’s laborious for her to tuck her swollen ft into the crooks of her knees whereas balancing her child bump. Rigorously shifting her stability, she sits subsequent to her daughter whereas mixing some rice and piping scorching rooster curry on a plate. As her daughter grows excited to be fed by her, Sunali’s swollen fingers sculpt a rice ball with chunks of rooster. Holding it earlier than her daughter’s face, they each change a heat smile. It’s an unstated reassurance that they’re now collectively after practically six months.
Going through her daughter and son, aged eight and 6, Sunali, who’s 9 months pregnant, struggles to string collectively phrases. “Kohun je din kete raat hoto ar ki bhabe je mash gulo kete gelo, ta mone nai (I don’t keep in mind how days become night time and the way weeks become months),” she says in Bengali. “All I keep in mind is being anxious concerning the youngster I’m but to provide beginning to and the one I had left behind in India,” she says whereas caressing her child bump. For Sunali, being with part of her household, near her ancestral residence in Birbhum’s Paikar village, is a large aid.
Sources say in August 2024, the Ministry of Residence Affairs had ordered a nationwide crackdown on Bangladeshi nationals staying illegally in India. Throughout Could and June 2025, in a post-Pahalgam-attack India, this intensified; “nationwide safety” was cited as a cause.
In July, the advocacy group Human Rights Watch stated in a report, “The Indian authorities has offered no official information on the variety of folks expelled, however Border Guard Bangladesh has reported that India expelled greater than 1,500 Muslim males, girls, and youngsters to Bangladesh between Could 7 and June 15, together with about 100 Rohingya refugees from Myanmar.”
Shock arrests
On June 18, when Danish Sheikh, Sunali’s husband, sat all the way down to eat a meal of their rented home in Delhi’s Rohini, three law enforcement officials got here to their shanty asking for Bengali-speaking migrants. Danish, a kabadiwala, who handled scrap; his neighbour Sweety Bibi; and her two sons, aged 17 and 6, have been taken to the Okay.N. Katju Marg police station in India’s Capital.
Additionally Learn | Sunali Khatun was pushed to Bangladesh regardless of being Indian, says Mamata Banerjee
“I received a name to convey Danish’s paperwork to the police station, however with out even checking something they put me and my son behind bars too,” says Sunali, including that she had carried her husband’s Aadhaar and voter ID playing cards. Her daughter was at a relative’s place that day.
Within the following hours, Sunali alleges that Delhi Police coerced her into accepting that they have been Bangladeshis. “We advised them that we have been from West Bengal’s Birbhum and had been working in Delhi, however no person listened,” she provides. They have been allegedly despatched to a confinement centre on June 24.
She says the six of them have been then allegedly flown from Delhi to Assam and on June 26 pushed over the Bangladesh border. “All through the journey, they didn’t give us meals or water. After they pushed us into the jungles, they threatened to shoot us if we didn’t cross over,” says Sunali. “We walked by way of the jungles, crossed rivers, and once we first caught sight of a hut, we knocked on the door to ask for alms,” she says, her voice trembling.
Sunali Khatun’s native residence in Paikar, in West Bengal’s Birbhum district.
| Photograph Credit score:
Alisha Dutta
The 2 households defined to the villager that they weren’t carrying any cash and had no telephones on them to achieve anybody. She remembers how the individual gave them some rice and curry to eat, and allowed them to relaxation.
Whereas the six Bengali migrants have been helped by the folks of Kurigram, Bangladesh, locals advised that they transfer away from the border villages and go to Dhaka looking for work so as to steer clear of the Border Guard Bangladesh. “They advised us to take up some work after which attempt to cross again after a number of weeks. However we have been quickly arrested from Alinagar (close to Dhaka) and put behind bars in Chapainawabganj (district),” says Sunali. No quantity of pleading and explaining helped, she says.
Reacting to allegations made by these pushed into Bangladesh, DCP (Rohini) Rajeev Ranjan says they have been handed over to the Foreigners Regional Registration Workplace after they failed to supply the required paperwork. “We’ve got not compelled anybody to just accept that they’re Bangladeshis. In any case, the matter is sub judice.”
Authorized battles
For the following three months, the six have been in jail for illegally coming into Bangladesh. They have been booked underneath the Management of Entry Act, 1952, which states, “No Indian citizen shall enter any a part of Bangladesh except he’s in possession of a passport with a visa authorising the entry.”
It provides that whoever contravenes this will probably be punished with imprisonment as much as a yr, or with a advantageous as much as 1,000 taka (Bangladeshi foreign money), or each.
In the meantime, the pushing of those six migrants throughout the border, together with the detention and so-called deportation of many different Bengali-speaking migrants, particularly from Bharatiya Janata Occasion-ruled States equivalent to Haryana, Gujarat, and Odisha, stirred turmoil in India.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, her Ministers, and ruling Trinamool Congress staff took out rallies throughout the State mid-year to protest the assault, detentions, and what they stated was linguistic profiling of Bengali migrants working in different States.
Three months after Sunali, Sweety, and their households have been pushed into Bangladesh, the Calcutta Excessive Court docket on September 26 quashed the Centre’s ‘deportation order’ and directed it to facilitate their return. The courtroom heard writ petitions filed by Sunali’s father, Bhodu Sheikh, and Sweety’s brother, Amir Khan. Bhodu says his title featured within the West Bengal Particular Intensive Revision of 2002.
In its order, the Division Bench, comprising Justices Tapabrata Chakraborty and Reetobroto Kumar Mitra, famous violations of the provisions of a memo of the Ministry of Residence Affairs dated Could 2, 2025. The memo acknowledged that an inquiry have to be taken up by the State or Union Territory authorities earlier than the deportation of any alleged Bangladeshi or Myanmar nationals discovered dwelling illegally on Indian soil.
The courtroom noticed that procedures laid down within the memo should have been adopted by authorities and “performing in scorching haste to deport them is a transparent violation which renders the deportation order dangerous in legislation and liable to be put aside”. The Union authorities, nevertheless, subsequently moved the Supreme Court docket difficult the Calcutta Excessive Court docket order. Lastly on December 3, the Centre agreed to repatriate Sunali and her minor son on “humanitarian grounds” after the apex courtroom’s intervention.
On December 1, when the Supreme Court docket first directed the Centre to think about bringing again Sunali and her son, Bhodu had little or no religion. “I had promised myself to not be hopeful till I noticed my daughter stroll in by way of the doorways of my home,” he says.
On December 6, when Sunali and her son have been introduced again to their village, her father remembers, “My daughter’s face appeared uninteresting and he or she appeared so frail, however I used to be completely happy.” Bhodu earlier expressed nervousness over the nationality of his grandchild had Sunali given beginning in Bangladesh. “The medical doctors have checked Sunali and advised us that she has sure medical issues and is weak, however match sufficient for youngster beginning,” he provides.
The supply ward the place Sunali Khatun has been admitted in Rampurhat Authorities Medical School and Hospital.
| Photograph Credit score:
Alisha Dutta
The West Bengal Chief Minister termed it the victory of her State and the Trinamool Congress towards a “Bangla-birodhi (anti-Bengal)” Union authorities. “How are Indian residents being labelled Bangladeshi? Was Sunali Khatun Bangladeshi? She was Indian. Regardless of her having Indian (paperwork), you pushed her to Bangladesh by way of the Border Safety Power,” Banerjee roared on stage at a rally in Malda, focusing on the BJP-led Central authorities hours after it determined to repatriate Sunali.
Rajya Sabha member from the Trinamool Congress and president of the West Bengal Migrant Employees Welfare Board Samirul Islam says his celebration did no matter was needed – from offering authorized assets to sending an emissary to Bangladesh – to assist convey the six again.
These left behind
Regardless of the bouquets and candy containers lining the cabinets inside Sunali’s maternity ward, the migrant employee is way from being comfy.
“Once I was taking my first chew of home-cooked meals, I received a flashback of the times I went with out meals in Bangladesh and the inedible meals served in jail,” she says.
Operating her fingers by way of her son’s hair, she talks of how he usually wakes up in the course of the night time terrified. “He has develop into very petrified of darkness; he doesn’t let any of us out of sight,” she provides.
Now solely days away from giving beginning, Sunali solely thinks about her husband who continues to be in Bangladesh. “They introduced us again, however I’m fearful what they are going to do to him. A father deserves to see his youngster being born, proper?”
On the opposite aspect of the border, Danish has been anxious relating to his repatriation. Talking over the phone, he says he has lived and labored in Delhi for over a decade. “In our village in Birbhum, we will both get work as a raj mistri (mason) or make beedis, however that’s not enough to run a household,” he says.
Anxious about his future, he asks if it’s a “crime emigrate for higher work”. “They picked us up simply because we spoke Bangla. Now, I’m in a distinct nation and may not be capable of witness the beginning of my youngster,” he says, sobbing.
In the meantime, Sweety, who additionally awaits repatriation alongside together with her two sons, is fearful about surviving as a single mom in a land she says she doesn’t know. About 100 km from Chapainawabganj, Bangladesh, in Fakirpara village in West Bengal’s Birbhum, Sweety’s mom Nazeena Bibi is fearful about her daughter and grandsons. Sweety’s center youngster, who now lives at Paikar with Nazeena, asks his grandmother daily about his mom’s return.
Sweety Bibi’s mom Nazeena Bibi sitting within the courtyard of their partially constructed two-storey home in Fakirpur at Paikar gram panchayat in West Bengal’s Birbhum district.
| Photograph Credit score:
MOYURIE SOM
“I’ve not been nicely since they took my youngster away. Again in June, when she was being pushed to Bangladesh, she may someway make one cellphone name. That was the final time we spoke earlier than they have been put in jail in Bangladesh. All she may say to me was, ‘Ma please save us; Ma, they’re sending us away’,” Nazeena says, seated within the courtyard of her one-storey home. A second storey is underneath development.
Behind her, two girls are rolling beedis. The sound of scissors snipping leaves into form accompanies Nazeena’s phrases in an unrelenting rhythm. The ladies, Sweety’s family members in a joint household, clarify how in Paikar, males of most households have migrated for work whereas the ladies have stayed again. They roll beedis for a meagre revenue, no more than ₹1,000-₹1,200 every week. In sure cases, like that of Sweety, a number of households migrate collectively, generally forsaking solely the aged.
Nazeena says how she can’t put a blanket on herself with out worrying about how her daughter and grandsons are weathering the chilly in Bangladesh. “Tin tinte jaan (Three lives are at stake),” she says. “It’s getting colder now; I fear if they’ve sufficient to remain heat.” She wonders why talking in Bangla led the police to consider they’re Bangladeshis when the entire of West Bengal speaks that language.
alisha.d@thehindu.co.in
moyurie.som@thehindu.co.in
Edited by Sunalini Mathew