BJP TODAY

September 16--30, 2005 - Vol. 14, No. 18

A recent statement in Parliament by the Union home minister on Bangladeshi infiltration, and a news report in an otherwise "secular" Hindi daily about the growing clout of illegal Bangladeshi resettlers in Kishanganj parliamentary constituency of Bihar have once more underscored the danger Indian civilisation faces, and the ostrich-like response of the political leadership to this demographic invasion.

Home minister Shivraj Patil, while speaking in Rajya Sabha on August 23, said that the Indian state could not distinguish between Hindu and Muslim illegal immigrants from Bangladesh as "refugees" and "infiltrators" respectively. Next day, there was another news item tucked inside the pages of the Hindi daily Navbharat Times (Aug. 24) about the decisive influence of Bangladeshi Muslims, resettled in Kishanganj, on electoral politics. Kishanganj, the sole Muslim majority district of Bihar, is almost adjacent to Bangladesh. Muslims form around 67 per cent of the district's population.

According to Navbharat Times, an unchecked influx of Bangladeshi infiltrators in the post-1971 period has changed the demographic character of the district. Bangladeshi Muslims are called "Sirsabadi" whereas local Muslims are called "Surjapuri." Muslims who have come from other parts of Bihar and UP are called "Paschimi" (western) Muslims. The strategy of the political parties is either to divide the Muslim vote or unify it according to need. A network of madrasas mushrooming all over the district is bedevilling the intelligence agencies.

A Bangladeshi Muslim who resettles in Kishanganj, uses a land grab technique, and invites several of his relatives and friends from Bangladesh. Kishanganj is part of the slender "chicken neck" that links the Northeast with the rest of India. What if this slender land route is choked and air bases in the Northeast blown up with explosives under some sinister plan by the ISI?

Now let's come to the home minister's inability to distinguish between infiltrators and refugees on religious lines. The suggestion had come from Pramod Mahajan in consonance with the BJP's long established views on the subject. Here is a simple and historic logic for such a distinction being made. Independent India developed a "secular" polity and never declared itself a Hindu state. But Pakistan that included East Pakistan, now Bangladesh, proclaimed itself an Islamic Republic. Pakistan, in principle, was created as a homeland for all Muslims of the Indian subcontinent. The residual India was meant for non-Muslims. All Muslim League leaders, between 1940 and 1946, had called for redrawing the demographic map of India through exchange of population on communal lines. However, this plan was never implemented.

So, though India was not a constitutionally Hindu country it was incumbent upon India to shelter any persecuted non-Muslim - Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist or Christian in Pakistan - or a non-Muslim willing to migrate to partitioned India. Similarly, it was incumbent upon Pakistan to accommodate any Muslim from the Indian subcontinent, either persecuted or willing to migrate. Pakistan (then West Pakistan), with its few weeks of partition, annihilated and expelled its Hindus and Sikhs who comprised around one-fifth of its population. But a large chunk of Hindus stayed back in East Pakistan only to be ejected in trickles and torrents from 1947 till date. A large number of Muslims continued to stay in West Bengal (now 25 per cent) none of whom had to migrate to East Pakistan after 1950.

In Israel, which was established within one year of India's independence, a Law of Return was promulgated in 1950 that grants every Jew, wherever he or she may be, the right to come to Israel as an oleh or aliya (a Jew immigrating to Israel), and become an Israeli citizen. Till East Pakistan existed, a Hindu could simply walk over to India especially West Bengal or Tripura, by citing communal insecurity as a reason and become an Indian. His or her educational qualifications would be valid in India at par Pakistan. All this changed with the Indira-Mujib Agreement (1972) and Treaty (1974).

When Mujib-ur-Rehman, the founder father of Bangladesh, declared Bangladesh to be a secular and democratic country, it was assumed that no Hindu, Buddhist or Christian would have reason to flee to India due to communal discrimination and persecution. But he was killed in an Army coup on August 15, 1974. The new military dictator, Zia-ur-Rehman, converted Bangladesh into a de facto Islamic state. Later, in 1988, President Mohammed Ershad officially dropped the word "secular" from Bangladesh's Constitution.

Today, Bangladesh can be aptly described as a vast concentration camp for Hindus, Buddhists and Christians. Their demographic share in Bangladesh's population has steadily plummeted. However, India never restored provisions for Hindu refugees as before 1972. India could at least go back to a pre-1971 situation when Bangladesh has de facto and de jure reneged from its commitment to secularism.

Pramod Mahajan has a point here. Since Bangladesh has become an Islamic Republic, why should not our policy be readjusted accordingly? Why should India accept Bangladeshi Muslims on its territory when they have their own government? We hear that Bangladeshi Muslims are coming to India purely for economic reasons, and the Leftists have termed them economic refugees. Now, as per UNO's definition, a refugee could be a person who has to flee his native country due to ethnic, religious, sectarian or political reasons.

The term "economic refugee" might be a Leftist copywriter's brainwave, but it has no meaning. That way, the entire Ethiopia might want to relocate itself to the US! In 1997, the UAE did a massive crackdown against illegal workers, mostly Indians and Pakistanis. Indian embassies and consulates had to work almost round the clock to secure their repatriation within the deadline. So a Bangladeshi Muslim can only be an infiltrator.

The Left that sponsors this theory of "economic refugees" is apparently blind to the fact that 30 per cent of our own people are placed below the poverty line; 20 million Bangladeshis are stealing the daily bread of an equal number of Indians. Bangladesh is actually outsourcing its poverty and squalor to India. It is ridiculous to link Bangladeshi infiltrators working in India with Indians working abroad. Indians who work abroad work not only with valid passports, visas, work permits, green cards, citizenship, but work in affluent countries. But Bangladeshis infiltrators are neither legal nor are we affluent like the Western or Gulf countries.

Emboldened by Census 2001 which the government tried to "adjust" with the sleight of hand, Pakistan has launched Operation Pin Code to create a Muslim dominated Northeast. We can't sleep over the problem that there are thousands of sleeper cells of ISI in the Northeast. All this is a step towards the Balkanisation of India and the creation of a "Mughlistan," a wide corridor linking Pakistan and Bangladesh. Contiguous districts in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal and Assam that might go Muslim majority within two decades with infiltration and explosive birth rates, afford that possibility.

On August 17, 400 small crude bombs exploding across 64 of Bangladesh's 65 districts might have injured only 100 people, but they sent a powerful message that the Talibanisation of Bangladesh was on the cards. According to Reuters, Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen has threatened more strikes on Dhaka unless puritan Islamic rule is imposed on Bangladesh. Will India afford to have a Taliban neighbour which might declare war on India like Khomeini's Iran did against Iraq? If India has nuclear bombs Bangladesh has innumerable jihadis. Our political indecisiveness will only augment the precarious situation we are in.

(Writer is a member of Rajya Sabha and Convenor of BJP Intellectual Cell)