Plantations, politics and population: The deepening impact of Bangladeshi influx in South India

New Delhi, Aug 26 (IAN)S After Prime Minister Narendra Modi cautioned about demographic changes during his Independence Day speech, Union Home Minister Amit Shah also spoke about the challenges regarding this issue.

Demographic change basically refers to transformations in population size and characteristics, resulting from shifts in birth rates, death rates and migration over a period of time. This has been a larger agenda of the Bangladesh-based Jamaat-e-Islami, which has taken upon itself to infiltrate as many Bangladeshis as possible and then change the demographics in many places, especially in West Bengal and the northeastern states.

Whenever this issue comes up, it is the northeastern states and West Bengal that are spoken about. However, gradually over time, the problem has spread deep and wide in the southern states, where the illegal Bangladeshi population has taken over the jobs of the locals.

The issue is deep-rooted in the plantation areas in Karnataka and Kerala, where labour is relatively expensive. Initially, many from the northeastern states would come down to these southern states in search of work. However, today, the illegal Bangladeshi migrants have outnumbered them.

The touts at the Bangladesh border who are in cahoots with their associates in these states work together to bring down these people. The security agencies have flagged this as a major problem and say that it would soon spiral out of control.

It has been found to be a huge syndicate that begins in Bangladesh and trickles down to South India.

When these illegal immigrants enter these states through their agents, they are told to tell the people that they are from Assam and hence have earned the tag Assam labour. However, their dialect is entirely different, and it does not sound like Assamese. It, in fact, sounds like East Bangla, and this is what led to the suspicion that they are either Bangladeshis or Rohingyas.

They hold Aadhar Cards and Voter Identity cards, and this helps them pass off as Indians. However, it is an open secret that their touts have these documents ready after they enter illegally into India illegally.

The illegal Bangladeshi workers began entering South India in large numbers after the Assam government published the NRC. The fear of being identified and sent back to their country led the touts to push them into southern states in large numbers. They were told that they should offer cheap labour so that the locals would be out of jobs.

If a local labourer works for Rs 600 a day, the illegal migrant would offer the same service at Rs 350, and the plantation owners find this to be profitable. Moreover, they are told not to mingle with the locals and stick with each other as a group to avoid suspicion.

When illegal immigrants enter India are given fake documents, the condition is that they should vote for a political party, as told by the touts. At the time of elections, they have to mandatorily be in the state where they obtained the details and failing to do so would lead to their documents being taken back and being pushed back into Bangladesh.

While today the situation has not erupted, it could get worse when more locals lose their jobs to these illegal immigrants. This would lead to communal tensions, and this serves the purpose of the Jamaat-e-Islami.

The Jamaat and the ISI had planned, after the Liberation War, to infiltrate as many Bangladeshis into India so that demographic change and communal violence would erupt.

This entire racket in South India is controlled by a mafia. It is, in fact, the touts in Kerala who manage all these people. The Intelligence agencies had warned that the migration into South India would happen through Kerala. It begins in Bangladesh and Myanmar, passes through the Northeast and then trickles into Kerala.

The security agencies say that, for now, it looks like just a labour issue. If this issue continues unchecked, the potential dangers are terrorism and crime. In many cases, illegal immigrants have been linked to terror activities such as the Bodhgaya and Burdwan blasts.

There could also be social and demographic issues which will lead to friction and unrest. Human trafficking is also another issue attached to this problem. There have been instances of large-scale trafficking of Bangladeshi women and children into the country for forced labour and commercial sex work.

--IANS

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