Breaking from recent trends, hundreds taken to the border and many others put in detention centres as part of a ‘ detect, delete and deport ’ crackdown on undocumented migrants. Hakimpur, India – Raisul Islam stands under the scorching sun near a checkpoint in Hakimpur village along the border with neighbouring Bangladesh in the North 24 Parganas district of India ’ s West Bengal state. The news has sparked debate among key stakeholders.

The Broader Picture

Context is essential to fully grasping the implications of this development.

The people crammed into the building are Muslim migrants from Bangladesh, who have been branded “ illegal infiltrators ” and brought to the border village as part of a “ detect, delete and deport ” policy launched by the state government headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi ’ s Hindu majoritarian Bharatiya Janata Party ( BJP), which stormed to control in West Bengal for the first time only a month ago.

India shares a 4,096km ( 2,545-mile) land border, the world ’ s fifth-longest, with Bangladesh, a Muslim-majority nation with historical and cultural ties to India, including a common language spoken by millions of Muslims and Hindus on both sides of the border, and a century-long history of migration of mainly impoverished workers between what is now Bangladesh and West Bengal, Assam and other Indian states.

At the same time, but after its comprehensive victory in West Bengal, home to nearly 100 million people, the state ’ s BJP government ordered a crackdown to trace undocumented Muslim migrants, while it also announced the construction of “ holding centres ” to detain and eventually deport them back to Bangladesh.

Expert Analysis

The implications of this development are already being assessed by those closest to the issue.

That drive has sparked fears not just among Bangladeshi migrants, but additionally among sections of Indian Muslims in West Bengal that they too could find themselves victims of a campaign that the government has made obvious is driven as much by the religious identity of its targets as by their legal status.

Compounding the significance of these events, in the summer of 2025, Indian security agencies in the neighbouring state of Assam — also ruled by Modi ’ s BJP — forcible sent dozens of Indian Muslims across the border into Bangladesh, accusing them of being undocumented immigrants.

At the same time, like many at the Hakimpur border checkpost, 38-year-old Islam, who hails from Satkhira district in Khulna division of Bangladesh, had come to India in search of a better livelihood.

Impact on Americans

Beyond the immediate headlines, this development could reshape how the issue is handled.

But their lives changed late last month after West Bengal state ’ s newly elected Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari ordered the deportation of undocumented Bangladeshi migrants, an exercise his party, the BJP, has already conducted in several states in the past decade.

In a related development, adhikari ’ s risk came with a caveat, though: The eviction would only target Muslim Bangladeshis, with Hindus and migrants from other faiths exempt under a controversial constitutional amendment that imposed a religious test on asylum seekers for the first time.

Meanwhile, sources familiar with the matter indicate that as a result, thousands of people have been rounded up across West Bengal in the past two weeks and either sent to detention centres or driven to the border by security forces to be “ pushed back ” into Bangladesh.

Adding further dimension to the story, several other migrants gathered at the Hakimpur border post narrated similar stories of economic hardships in Bangladesh that required them to hire touts and cross the border – various without legal documents.

Against this backdrop, mirazul Ghazi, 42, notified Al Jazeera he entered India, along with his wife Sabina Yasmin, 36, and their son Nayem, 18, five years ago in search of better opportunities.

Looking Ahead

This remains an active and fast-moving story. With significant stakes and wide-ranging implications, the next few days are expected to bring greater clarity on several outstanding questions.