Eye on Bengal polls, RSS to seek crackdown on Bangladeshi illegals

With a little over a year left for the West Bengal Assembly battle between the Mamata Banerjee-led TMC and the BJP, the issue of illegal immigration from Bangladesh is likely to become an important election issue for the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

As the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) finetunes its electoral strategy for Bengal, the party is getting help from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), its ideological parent. The RSS is starting a pan-India movement to ensure that action is taken by state and Union governments against all illegal Bangladeshi nationals in India.

Focus on Bangladeshi illegals

Although a final blueprint is still being prepared at the Akhil Bharatiya Pratinidhi Sabha (ABPS), the highest decision-making body of the RSS, which is holding a three-day meeting in Bengaluru till March 23, RSS leaders are likely to push the Centre, the BJP, and NDA-ruled state governments to identify and deport all Bangladeshi nationals staying in India illegally.

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“The question of Bangladeshis illegally entering India is not new but there should be strict action against those who do not have valid documentation. Why should anyone be allowed to live in India illegally? The state and Union governments must identify such people. This is a major security threat,” a senior RSS leader involved in the discussions in Bengaluru told The Federal.

‘A national movement’

The RSS is also asking Prime Minister Narendra Modi to ensure that the minorities in Bangladesh, especially Hindus, do not face the fear of conversion and other issues.

Referring to governmental action against illegals in the United States and Europe, Dilip Deodhar, a Nagpur-based author and observer on the RSS, told The Federal that similar action was needed in India as well.

“The Union government is trying to act against such people. The RSS wants to scale up the action and make it a national movement,” he added.

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RSS and foreign policy

The influence of the RSS on the decision making of the Modi government is not new but its influence on foreign policy is gaining strength.

The issue of Bangladeshi nationals illegally living in India is not the only foreign policy issue indicating the influence of the RSS. Its leaders are keen that the next meeting of the ABPS should take place in the North East, especially in Arunachal Pradesh.

RSS and North East

“There are two places which have been shortlisted. The first is Arunachal Pradesh and the second is Meghalaya… The RSS is keen the meeting should happen in Arunachal,” Deodhar said.

Some RSS sources believe that a meeting in Arunachal Pradesh could create diplomatic problems for the Modi government as China, which claims the region as southern Tibet.

According to Deodhar, the RSS is working through the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh (HSS), which functions abroad and includes many RSS activists. The RSS wanted the Modi government to use Bharat at the G20 meet rather than India. “The influence of the RSS in foreign policy is gaining momentum,” he added.

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Protecting Hindus

Political analysts believe the issue of protection of Hindus in countries like Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan is an emotional issue for the RSS and has also fetched electoral dividends to the BJP.

“While the RSS is talking about protection of Hindus in Bangladesh, action against illegal Bangladeshi nationals in India is a tactic that has brought electoral dividends to the BJP,” Yatindra Singh Sisodia, director at the Madhya Pradesh Institute of Social Science Research, Ujjain, told The Federal.

Activists of the BJP, RSS and allied groups have been at the forefront of anti-Bangladesh protests across West Bengal over attacks on Hindus blamed on Islamists since the ouster of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in August last year.