By IANS,
Agartala : The Tripura police have arrested 31 Bangladeshi nationals who were working as labourers in a brick kiln in the northeastern state, officials said here Thursday.
“Acting on information from the Border Security Force (BSF), we arrested 29 Bangladeshi nationals Wednesday night from a brick kiln at Amtali, the outskirts of capital Agartala,” said police spokesman Mihir Roy.
Roy told IANS: “Earlier Monday BSF had apprehended two Bangladeshi nationals from the bordering village Lankamura, near here, and on the basis of the information given by them to the BSF, police raided the brick kiln.”
All the Bangladeshi nationals were produced before the court Thursday, which later sent them to 14-days police custody.
“Preliminary investigation revealed that the Bangladeshi nationals came here to work as labourers or rickshaw pullers. However, investigations and interrogations are on to find out whether the arrested people have any kind of criminal background or links with any clandestine outfits,” Roy said.
“Hundreds of Bangladeshi labourers and workers come everyday to the bordering states to work in India. Majority of them return to their country but some of them remain here with fake names,” a senior police official said.
“After the serial blasts in Indian cities in October and Mumbai terror attacks last month and on the basis of intelligence reports, the union home ministry had asked the security forces, specially the BSF, to strengthen security along the border to prevent terrorists movements and their clandestine activities,” the official told IANS on condition of anonymity.
Out of the 4,095-km India-Bangladesh border, the northeastern state of Tripura shares an 856 km-long international border with Bangladesh.