By Bhupen Goswami

Guwahati : Indian government has spent Rs 1138.48 crore in the last five years for fencing the porous Indo-Banglaborder.

Union minister of state for home Nityanand Rai told the Lok Sabha on today, “Rs 1138.48 crore has been spent for the international border fencing between India and Bangladesh during the last five years.Rai said the schemes for creation of border infrastructure works on Indo-Bangladesh border like fence, road, floodlight and BOPs are in progress.Out of 4,096 km India-Bangladesh border, 2,803.013 km have been fenced.“169.64 km work is in progress and the remaining will be completed by 2020,” said Rai.“Border guarding forces conduct regular patrolling, lay nakas and establish observation posts and carry out anti tunneling exercise to stop illegal infiltration,” he said.

He admitted that some illegal migrants are able to enter into India.“However, some illegal migrants are able to enter in a clandestine and surreptitious manner, mainly due to difficult riverine terrain in parts of international border with Bangladesh which are not amenable to physical fencing,” said Rai.

“As such, the accurate number of infiltrators is not available,” added Rai.He said 496 infiltrators were apprehended from areas along the India-Bangladesh border. ”On other hand A total of 9 Bangladeshi nationals were released on Tuesday from the detention centre of the Central Jail, Tezpur, to be deported to their country.Altogether 32 Bangladeshis were arrested by Sonitpur, Morigaon and Dhemaji police from different places on charges of illegally entering into the Indian soil.After their arrest, the Bangladeshi nationals were kept in the Tezpur detention camp.Earlier, they were kept in different jails of Assam after their apprehension by the police.The released Bangladeshi nationals include Jahangir Alam, Abdul Kasem, Mahhamad Abdullah, Abdul Kalam Molla, Ajabahar Peada, Babul Sardar, Waidul Haque, Elius Ahmed and Nurul Alam.They will now be deported to Bangaladesh through the Indo-Bangla border in Assam’s Karimganj district.

However, handing over the 9 Bangladeshi nationals to the border police, the superintendent of the Central Jail, Tezpur, Mrinmoy Dawka alleged that Bangladeshi nationals use to enter into the Indian soil taking advantage of security lapses in the border areas.He also alleged that some Border Security Force (BSF) personnel are also involved in the infiltration of illegal Bangladeshi nationals.Briefing the media at Tezpur, police officer Dawka alleged that besides illegal entry of the Bangladeshi nationals into the Indian soil, many criminal activities take place in the Indo-Bangla border with the help of some Indian security force personnel engaged in the international border.“As security force personnel are not strict in the border areas, illegal infiltrators take the chance of entering into India,” he mentioned.