Kamaluddin after his arrest on Friday. Picture by Eastern Projections

Silchar, Aug. 4: Intrepid border hopper Md Kamruddin alias Kamaluddin, the latest rallying point for anti-foreigner campaigners in Assam, today more than indicated that he would return to the wife and children he was leaving behind in a remote village in Nagaon district.

As he waited to be deported to Bangladesh — for the third time — he also wished that the world was an entity “without borders”. The man had been deported twice before but returned to his wife Dilwara Begum, a girl from Lanka sub-division in Nagaon district, whom he married in 1990.

The news of Kamaluddin’s deportation from Mahisashan checkpost in Karimganj district generated a lot of interest with hundreds of curious onlookers turning up to have a glimpse of the 52-year-old seasoned infiltrator. His name cropped up in a Gauhati High Court ruling on July 23 in an infiltration case wherein it was mentioned that Kamaluddin, after successfully but illegally entering Assam from Pakistan through Bangladesh, not only roamed freely on Indian soil but also contested the 1996 Assembly election from Jamunamukh constituency.

He was arrested on Friday night from his Kapashbari residence in Nagaon district when Dispur ordered the police to find him after AASU and the Opposition AGP and the BJP continued to harp on Kamaluddin’s audacity to embarrass the government on its failure to check influx.

His wife, three daughters and three sons are still in Moirajhar, the police said. His eldest daughter is married. Kamaluddin, however, maintained a brave front in his hour of crisis.

As he was readying for deportation to his native Chenga village under Moulvi Bazar, a tea district in Bangladesh, it was clear where his heart lay when he said he would return to his family “if possible”.

He, however, refused to confirm if he ever landed in Pakistan before coming to India but added that the reports of being an ISI spy was a canard. He said he was forced to flee to Assam across the border via Tripura after his elder brother Akadash Ali framed him in a murder case in con- nivance with Moulvi Bazaar police in the neighbouring country. He said one of his younger brothers, too, had sneaked into India and was in Nagaon.

Kamaluddin was taken to Karimganj district for his deportation to Bangladesh from Mahisashan village, 67km south-west of this town today.