Gurugram Police Releases Bengali Migrant Workers, Only Ten ‘Confirmed Bangladeshis' Remain, It Says

The Wire

2 days ago

Government
The police are yet to confirm the exact number of detainees released. They now say that verification is ongoing and 'only highly suspicious individuals will be picked up'.
Women from an Assamese Muslim neighbourhood in Gurugram's Khatola village on their way to meeting their detained husbands. Photo: Alishan Jafri
Gurugram police public relations officer Sandeep Kumar confirmed that all but ten detainees have been released. He claimed that these ten people are undocumented immigrants from Bangladesh and that the police have now initiated the process for their deportation.
'Nobody is there except ten individuals who are confirmed Bangladeshis,' he said.
However, he did not confirm the total number of people who were detained and later released.
When The Wire asked on what basis these individuals were identified as undocumented immigrants while the others were released, Kumar claimed, 'The ten suspects possess documents that prove they are from Bangladesh.'
Asked if the authorities' drive to identify and deport undocumented Bangladeshi citizens will go on or intensify, he said, 'verification is going on and only highly suspicious individuals will be picked up'.
When asked if the hundreds of people detained and released earlier were also 'highly suspicious', Kumar questioned the source of this figure, although he added that the drive is ongoing and that official numbers can't be shared at this point.
Regarding the process of releasing detainees, he said, 'We contacted the district administrations of the areas the detainees claimed as their home. After verifying their citizenship through the respective district officials, we released them.'
The detainees' release comes amidst growing public scrutiny and pushback from opposition leaders and civil society.
Calling the detentions in Gurugram 'linguistic terrorism', West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee wrote that she was shocked to see 'these terrible atrocities of double-engine governments on Bengalis in India'. 'What do you want to prove? This is atrocious and terrible. We are not going to tolerate this.'
In a video message on X, Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra compared the drive to 'living in Nazi Germany'.
Terming these ' wide-net detentions ' illegal, Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi wrote on X, 'This government acts strong with the weak, and weak with the strong. Most of those who are accused of being 'illegal immigrants' are the poorest of the poor: slum-dwellers, cleaners, domestic workers, rag-pickers, etc. They have been targeted repeatedly because they are not in a position to challenge police atrocities.'
On Friday, Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya visited Bengali migrants in Gurugram.
Amanur Sheikh's shanty in the Bengali ragpicker colony near the Kapasheda border between Delhi and Gurugram. Photo: Alishan Jafri
Large numbers of Bengali-speaking migrant workers have fled to Assam and West Bengal.
When The Wire visited a neighbourhood in Gurugram's Khatola village known for its large Assamese Muslim population – and where residents claimed nearly 2,000 people used to live – it was almost entirely deserted. Only around a dozen women were present, who were about to visit their husbands and other male relatives held in detention centres.
Barring a few people, the entire neighbourhood has apparently fled to Assam's Dhubri following the recent crackdown.
And now after the release of detainees, many, including Sayra Bano and her family, are going back to Assam.
All the migrant workers The Wire covered in its previous report from Gurugram have been released.
Amanur Sheikh, brother of Hafijur who was detained in a Sector 10A 'holding camp', said that his brother has been released but that they are still living in fear.
Rafukul Islam was released by the police on July 23 after being held in detention for over five days. He was detained on July 18 and taken to the Basapur City Centre vote camp, which the police refer to as a 'holding centre'.
According to Islam, around 150 people were detained in that facility. He claimed that 15 or 16 among them were Hindus and were released earlier. The remaining detainees, he said, were Muslims from Assam and Bengal.
'There were 27 people I personally knew who were detained along with me. We were all picked up from the same neighbourhood. The police have released all of us,' he said.
When asked what the police told them before releasing them, Rafukul replied, 'They didn't say anything. They just made us sign on a few papers and told us to go. They said, ' Tum log ab jao yahan se, tumhara ho gaya abhi ' ('You people can go now, it's done').'
He also claimed that the police confiscated their mobile phones. 'A few people got their phones back, but the rest of us, including me, didn't get ours.'
Following their release, Islam and the others left the National Capital Region and returned to their villages. Rafukul hails from the Kokrajhar district of Assam.
'When things return to normal, we will come back,' he said. 'Our livelihood is there, how can we stay away for long? What will we eat? But right now, we can't stay in Gurugram. Who knows when they might come and detain us again?'
When asked on what grounds the police detained them, Islam said, 'The police asked us where we were from. When we said we're from Assam, they replied, 'No, no, you're from Bangladesh, go sit in the vehicle.' Then they took us to the centre.'
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