Pushed to B'desh 50 days ago, man returns on HC hearing day
A
BSF
explanation in the Calcutta High Court a couple of hours after Amir's return through the Basirhat border only added to the mystery as the agency insisted that he had crossed over to Bangladesh "inadvertently". "We have been told that this person inadvertently crossed over the border and went to Bangladesh and was apprehended by the BSF while crossing back to India," deputy solicitor-general Rajdeep Majumdar submitted.
Amir was stuck in Bangladesh since June 25, prompting his father — Jiyem Sheikh — to file a habeas corpus petition in the Calcutta HC; he accused Rajasthan cops of arresting him for being a "Bangladeshi in India illegally", jailing him and then pushing him to Bangladesh with BSF help.
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A division bench of Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty and Justice Reetobroto Kumar Mitra asked Jiyem on Wednesday to furnish a bond and take his son home after providing all details.
Basirhat cops said the BSF handed Amir over to them at the Ghojadanga border. "We released him to his family in accordance with the Calcutta HC order after an initial inquiry based on details provided by the BSF," Basirhat superintendent of police Hossain Mehdi Rehman told TOI.
Amir's plight came to light only after a viral video from Bangladesh, his father told the HC in his petition. Amir was working at a Sikar construction site since May but was detained by Rajasthan cops for being a Bangladeshi and pushed over the border on June 25, he added.
A video surfaced on social media on July 2 showing a visibly distressed Amir in police custody in Bangladesh's Khulna. Amir was seen crying as he said: "I was working in Rajasthan. Police picked me up, saying I was a Bangladeshi."
In the video, Amir is heard saying, "I showed my Aadhaar. I got additional documents tracing myself to Malda's Kaliachak. But they insisted on proof that I did not have. They kept me in jail for several weeks, handcuffed me and brought me here (unidentifiable place) and the BSF pushed me into Bangladesh.
I do not know anybody in Bangladesh, I have nothing to eat."The Bengal administration stepped in after that as more and more tales of migrant workers from the state being harassed by cops — mostly in BJP-governed states like Delhi, Haryana and Maharashtra — poured in.
"My son had his Aadhaar and tried to convince Rajasthan cops that he was from Malda but was labelled a Bangladeshi," Jiyem said. "Our family has been living in Malda's Jalalpur for 400 years.
We have land records since the 1950s?" he added.
West Bengal Migrant Labour Board chairperson and Trinamool Congress Rajya Sabha MP Samirul Islam said it was only because of the pressure that the BSF was forced to bring Amir back to Bengal. "They are now claiming that Amir was never deported! Then what happened? How did he end up in Bangladesh?" Islam asked, adding: "They first persecuted a poor man and now the BSF is resorting to lies after being thoroughly exposed.
But that has always been the BJP policy."
(Inputs from Subhro Maitra in Malda and Sanjib Chakraborty in Basirhat)
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