Large number of Bangladeshi migrants illegally entering India through Tripura: Tipra Motha chief Pradyot Deb Barma

Guwahati: Raising the issue of influx from neighbouring Bangladesh, Pradyot Deb Barma, founder of Tipra Motha, an ally of the BJP-led governemnt, on Thursday said nothing has changed in the past five years.

"For every 10 people apprehended from Bangladesh border, there are hundred who are entering illegally. They then find their home in Tripura or melt away within the population across the Northeast and India," Deb Barma said in a social media post.

He shared a video showing several people walking on an open field. The video, Deb Barma said, was that of Bangladeshi migrants crossing the unfenced border in Tripura. He said the video was recorded five years ago by Brishaketu Deb Barma, now a minister in the BJP-led government in the state. "It has been five years, nothing has changed," he said.

With 13 MLAs, Tipra Motha joined the government in March this year.

This comes days after Tripura CM Manik Saha and former CM Biplab Kumar Deb urged the Centre to fence the unfenced stretch of the border in view of the rising influx since Sheikh Hasina government was ousted in Bangladesh in August.

Tripura shares 856km border of which a little over 26km has remained unfenced allowing the migrants to illegally cross into India.

The BSF and the state police in Tripura, Assam and Meghalaya has been arresting illegal migrants almost daily since the urest unfolded in Bangladesh. Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma recently said 189 Bangladeshis have been arrested or pushed back from the border since the unrest started in Bangladesh. He said all those were found to be Muslims and many had managed to travel to South Indian states by arranging fake Indian identity documents.

Deb Barma said large scale illegal migration since the partition and thereafter reduced the indigenous people of Tripura into minority. He has also been seeking action to check attacks and atrocities on the minorities in Bangladesh, including the indigenous people in the Chittagong Hill Tracts.