India Accused of Forcibly Expelling Bengali-Speaking Muslims into Bangladesh: HRW
India has deported hundreds of ethnic Bengali-speaking Muslims to Bangladesh without due legal process, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a report released Thursday, accusing the Indian government of violating international norms and promoting religious discrimination.
The report targets the Hindu nationalist administration of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which has maintained a hardline stance on immigration, particularly from Muslim-majority Bangladesh. Senior officials in the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have previously described such immigrants as “infiltrators” and “termites.”
Critics say the government’s policies have contributed to growing fear among India’s 200 million Muslims—especially Bengali speakers, a language shared across eastern India and Bangladesh.
According to HRW, over 1,500 Muslim men, women, and children were forcibly expelled to Bangladesh between May 7 and June 15, citing Bangladeshi official sources.
“India’s ruling BJP is fuelling discrimination by arbitrarily expelling Bengali Muslims from the country, including Indian citizens,” said Elaine Pearson, Asia Director at HRW. “The Indian government is putting thousands of vulnerable people at risk under the guise of targeting undocumented immigrants, reflecting broader discriminatory policies against Muslims.”
India maintains that those expelled were undocumented migrants.
‘They Were Holding Guns’
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HRW said it reached out to India’s Ministry of Home Affairs with the report’s findings and questions but received no response.
The report includes testimonies from 18 individuals. One 51-year-old daily wage laborer recounted that he was taken to the border by India’s Border Security Force (BSF) after midnight. “I walked into Bangladesh like a dead body,” he said. “I thought they would kill me because they were holding guns, and no one in my family would ever know.”
Tensions between India and Bangladesh have escalated since a popular uprising in 2024 ousted Dhaka’s pro-India government. The crackdown on migrants intensified further after an April 2025 attack in Indian-occupied Kashmir killed 26 people, most of them Hindu tourists. India accused Pakistan of orchestrating the attack—a claim Islamabad has denied.
In the aftermath, India launched an unprecedented nationwide security operation, detaining thousands—many of whom were later expelled across the Bangladeshi border.
“The government is undermining India’s historic role as a refuge for the persecuted in a bid to generate political support,” Pearson added.
India has also been criticized for its forced deportation of Rohingya Muslim refugees to Myanmar, with some reportedly being returned by naval vessels to the conflict-ridden country.