Shillong: Cattle smuggling and killing of Bangladeshi nationals along the India-Bangladesh border have decreased in recent times, BSF director-general K.K. Sharma said in a news conference here on Friday. In the last three years, the "overall number" of cattle going to Bangladesh has come down.
As per statistics, in 2016 the BSF seized 174,469 cattle heads along the 4,096km border with Bangladesh. The number in 2017 came down to 111,615. This year till March, 31,16,847 cattle heads have been seized.
However, in the Meghalaya sector, which shares a 443km border with Bangladesh, the number of cattle heads seizedhas increased drastically from 2016 to 2017. While in 2016 it was 3,418, the number rose to 9,931 last year.
Sharma said the reduction in number of cattle heads taken to Bangladesh could be the result of deployment of more forces at crucial places, use of more technical equipment, identification of vulnerable border outposts and better coordination with local police.
The BSF chief said as livelihood of people along the border depends on cattle trade, the issue has a "humanitarian" side.
"There are many cattle haats in West Bengal near the border. This makes it very difficult for us to completely stop cattle smuggling. Nevertheless, we are successful to a great extent in stopping it," he said.
On the killing of Bangladeshi nationals, Sharma said the BSF has been using non-lethal weapons to minimise deaths of foreign nationals.
"We have a friendly government in Bangladesh. Whenever any Bangladeshi national is killed along the border, the government there comes under tremendous pressure. As a result, the ministry of external affairs through the ministry of home affairs has told us to reduce number of killings. So we are using pump-action guns instead of the regular Insas rifles for guarding the border," the BSF chief said.
Only 10 Bangladeshi smugglers were killed last year, he said, adding this year no Bangladeshi has been killed.
On the seizure of narcotics, the BSF highlighted that in 2016, 485,102 bottles of phensedyl were seized while in 2017 the number is 427,152. Last year 10,568.790kg ganja was seized.
