A division bench led by Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty of Calcutta High Court on Thursday directed Bengal chief secretary Manoj Pant to appoint an officer, not below the rank of secretary, to address problems that migrant labourers have been facing in various states.
“Take the issue very seriously. The officer appointed by the chief secretary will contact Odisha and other (state) governments immediately. This kind of incident cannot be allowed to continue,” Justice Chakraborty said, asking the chief secretary to file a compliance report on Monday.
The order followed a petition by a family member of a migrant labourer from Bengal.
The lawyer appearing for the petitioner said how migrant workers from Bengal were being “harassed and tortured” in other states.
“Very recently a migrant labourer was held in Delhi and tagged as a Bangladeshi despite having valid Indian documents. He was detained in Delhi and the BSF forcefully pushed him into Bangladesh,” the lawyer said.
He claimed Bengal migrant labourers in several states were facing the same problem — being suspected as Bangladeshis and subsequently detained.
“They are also being tortured and in Odisha it has reached a point where Bengali-speaking people are being identified as Bangladeshi nationals. Many of the migrant labourers have been forcibly driven out of the state,” the lawyer said.
Appearing virtually on behalf of the state, Trinamool MP and advocate Kalyan Banerjee said: “This is a very serious issue. Not only from Odisha, reports of torture on Bengalis are coming in from Assam and many other states.”
Advocate-general Kishore Datta was present in the court. The court will hear the matter again on Monday.
Welcoming the court’s order, Samirul Islam, chairman of the West Bengal Migrant Workers’ Welfare Board, said the division bench would hear two separate habeas corpus petitions filed by families of migrant workers allegedly deported to Bangladesh.
Samirul, who is also a Trinamool Rajya Sabha , said: “We will see an end to the undemocratic and unlawful detention of these Bengali-speaking migrant workers. The BJP-ruled states should know that they are Indian citizens and have been living in Bengal since the time of their forefathers.”
The issue of targeting Bengali-speaking migrant workers, mostly Muslims, in BJP-ruled states like Delhi, Maharashtra, Haryana and particularly Odisha, has snowballed into a political controversy as the number of detainees continues to increase.
It has prompted the ruling Trinamool to pitch a new anti-Bengali narrative against the BJP ahead of next year’s Assembly polls, especially as Bengal migrants with Aadhaar and voter cards are often illegally detained on the suspicion of being Bangladeshi infiltrators.
Many Trinamool lawmakers, such as Krishnanagar MP Mahua Moitra, have attacked governments in BJP-ruled states for illegally detaining Bengal migrant workers.
The Bengal BJP, however, has blamed the Mamata Banerjee government for the current situation.
BJP Rajya Sabha member and state unit chief Samik Bhattacharya said: “Lakhs of infiltrators have obtained fake identity documents using Bengal addresses, often helped by gram panchayats and municipalities. The Trinamool is to blame for what is
happening today.”
Countering this, CPM state secretary Md Salim slammed the state BJP chief. Speaking to reporters in Behrampore, he said: “Samik Bhattacharya has said he wants to equip Muslims with books and pens. First ask him to end the torture of Muslim migrant workers in BJP-ruled states where they are being tagged as Bangladeshi nationals. They are being tortured because they are Bengali Muslims. Ask him to oppose and end the torture of workers and then can he try to educate them.”