India has unlawfully expelled hundreds of Bengali-speaking Muslims — including Indian citizens — to Bangladesh in recent weeks, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW).
The campaign, spearheaded by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has involved forced deportations without legal proceedings, violent pushbacks at the border, and demolitions of Muslim homes.
Victims include long-standing Indian residents and Rohingya refugees registered with the United Nations.
“India’s ruling BJP is fuelling discrimination by arbitrarily expelling Bengali Muslims from the country, including Indian citizens,” said Elaine Pearson, HRW’s Asia Director. “The authorities’ claims that they are managing irregular immigration are unconvincing, given their disregard for due process rights.”
Mass expulsions and abuse
The crackdown intensified in May following a deadly attack on tourists in Jammu and Kashmir. HRW interviewed 18 people in June, including victims and relatives, who described being beaten, threatened, or forced at gunpoint to cross into Bangladesh.
Khairul Islam, a 51-year-old teacher from Assam, was expelled on May 26. “The BSF officer beat me when I refused to cross the border into Bangladesh and fired rubber bullets in the air,” he said. He managed to return two weeks later.
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According to Bangladesh’s Border Guard, more than 1,500 Muslims — including women and children — were pushed across the border between May 7 and June 15. Around 100 of them were Rohingya refugees.
In several BJP-ruled states — including Assam, Maharashtra, Odisha, Gujarat and Rajasthan — Muslim migrant workers have been detained and expelled without proper citizenship verification. In many cases, those expelled had valid documents and were awaiting court decisions.
A daily wage worker from Assam’s Barpeta district, who had a case pending in the Supreme Court, said: “I walked into Bangladesh like a dead body. I thought they [the BSF] would kill me because they were holding guns and no one from my family would know.”
Elderly and vulnerable targeted
Even the elderly and disabled have not been spared. Maleka Khatun, a 67-year-old woman who cannot walk unaided, was deported on May 27 despite being on bail and awaiting trial after six years in detention. Her son said: “I have no idea how to bring her back.”
Families with valid documentation are often torn apart, with one member declared an “irregular immigrant” over minor paperwork discrepancies.
Assam’s controversial Foreigners Tribunals have been accused of bias and lack of transparency, having declared over 165,000 people “illegal immigrants” since 1964.
Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma admitted that at least 330 people were deported without appearing before a tribunal.
“If someone is identified as a foreigner, we won’t send them to a tribunal; we will just keep pushing them back,” he said.
Wider crackdown and demolitions
Meanwhile, in Gujarat, over 10,000 homes, mosques, and shops in Bengali Muslim neighbourhoods were demolished without prior warning depute the fact that the Supreme Court of India has ruled that such demolitions are illegal if conducted without due process.
United Nations experts condemned the demolitions, warning that “national security” should not be used as a justification for collective punishment.
In Odisha, 444 Muslim migrant workers were detained, with 44 still held in makeshift centres. In Rajasthan, officials deported at least 148 individuals, while in Jaipur, two tribal Muslim cousins were detained due to their names and released only after weeks of legal struggle.
In Maharashtra, Muslim migrants from West Bengal were expelled despite being Indian citizens. One man, Nazimuddin Sheikh, said: “The Border Security Force did not listen to us when we told them we are Indian. If we spoke too much, they beat us with sticks.” He was allowed to return only after the West Bengal government intervened.
The state’s Chief Minister said: “Is speaking Bengali a crime? You should be ashamed that by doing this, you’re making everyone who speaks Bengali appear to be Bangladeshi.”
Rohingya refugees pushed into danger
Among those deported were Rohingya refugees fleeing genocide in Myanmar. In May, Indian officials reportedly forced around 40 Rohingya into the sea near Myanmar, giving them only life jackets.
A 20-year-old Rohingya refugee said: “I escaped to India seeking safety and dignity, but the suffering did not end — it only changed form… My adulthood faces a fate worse than anything I’ve survived.”
UN Special Rapporteur Tom Andrews described the deportations as “an affront to human decency” and a serious breach of international law.
India is a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which prohibits deportations without legal review. However, HRW says the Indian government is ignoring these obligations.
“The government is undercutting India’s long history of providing refuge to the persecuted as it tries to generate political support,” said Pearson.
Aman Wadud, a lawyer representing many Bengali Muslims in Assam, said people are being detained without any trace. “They are picking people up, and there is no information about their whereabouts.” He filed a complaint with the National Human Rights Commission in May but received no response.
On June 5, over 100 activists and academics signed an open letter urging the Indian government to halt the expulsions. “Pushbacks risk putting people into grave peril,” the letter said.
HRW has called on the Indian government to immediately halt unlawful deportations, end the use of force, and uphold legal protections for all those facing expulsion.
