Patna, March 29 The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders on Sunday called for the fencing of the border areas in West Bengal that adjoin Bangladesh, accusing the Trinamool Congress government, led by Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, of "providing protection to infiltrators".
The reactions follow a day after Union Home Minister Amit Shah released the BJP’s 35-page ‘white paper’ on 15 years of Trinamool Congress rule in West Bengal. The document claimed that 569 km of the 2,216.7 km international border with Bangladesh in West Bengal remains unfenced, allegedly due to delays by the state government in land acquisition for barbed fencing, which, it said, has facilitated infiltration.
Earlier in the day, Bihar Minister and BJP leader Dilip Kumar Jaiswal told reporters, "The border areas of Bengal that earlier shared a boundary with (East) Pakistan, now share a boundary with Bangladesh, stretching from West Bengal to Assam. Therefore, it is essential that fencing be carried out across the entire region."
He further elaborated, "Some places have hilly terrain, there are rivers too, so that becomes a problem for fencing, and illegal infiltrators are taking advantage of that. So it is very important for the country that fencing should be done there. Then nobody would attempt to dent the security of the country from there."
Notably, the BJP document accused the Trinamool Congress of running syndicates to facilitate the issuance of fake identity cards to infiltrators in order to build “vote banks”, thereby compromising national security and demographic balance.
Bihar BJP President Sanjay Saraogi, while coming in support of the party's 'white paper', accused the Trinamool Congress-led West Bengal government of shielding illegal infiltrators.
He said, "Home Minister Amit Shah has rightly spoken about the condition of West Bengal, the Trinamool government (in the state) and Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. Whether infiltrators, Rohingyas, or Bangladeshis, everybody is being given protection by the Trinamool government."
The Bihar BJP President also alleged that the state's resources are being misused due to illegal infiltration.
"The infiltrators and Bangladeshis are misusing the resources of the state, which is why the people of Bengal are unable to use these resources. So whatever HM Shah said is right," he said.
Sharpening his attack on Trinamool, Saraogi said, "The Bengal government is involved in facilitating the entry of infiltrators from Bangladesh into West Bengal."
"Both Trinamool Congress as well as Mamata Banerjee will have to bear the consequences of this in the coming days, when the BJP will form its government in the state," he told reporters.
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