KOLKATA: Seventy three more Rohingya refugees have settled down in the refugee camp in Hardah
village in West Bengal’s South 24 Parganas on Wednesday, taking the total number of inmates to 102. Some 29 Rohingyas from Bangladesh’s Chittagong had earlier settled in West Bengal’s only Rohingya camp.
Speaking to The New Indian Express, Desh Bachao Samajik Committee (DBSC) president Hosen Gazi, who settled the Rohingyas on his land, refuted media reports that the fresh batch of Rohingyas had
sneaked in from Bangladesh through the porous border after he allegedly set up an office at Teknaf near
Bangladesh-Myanmar border to bring in the Rohingyas into India.
“These UNHCR-registered Rohingya refugees landed up at Hardah on Tuesday night without informing me. They are from camps in Haryana and Delhi and were forced to migrate here after their dwellings
gutted in a major fire a few days ago. I am very busy arranging food and shelter for so many people,” he said.
“These Rohingyas have not infiltrated from Bangladesh and I do not have any office in Teknaf. I have no relations with Bangladesh. SP saheb (South 24 Parganas superintendent of police) had summoned me to
find out the truth and I told him everything very clearly,” he added.
BSF verified that the Rohingyas have not infiltrated from Bangladesh. “After receiving information that the Rohingyas had crossed over from Bangladesh, we searched the fresh batch upon their arrival
last night at Hardah refugee camp but did not find any telltale signs signaling that they had crossed over from Bangladesh. Nevertheless, we have deployed 10-12 troops at the camp to look out for new Rohingya faces and have increased vigil along the riverine Sandeskhali sector of the border through which these Rohingyas were rumoured to have slipped in,” said BSF commandant Ratnesh Kumar.
Some 29 Rohingyas from refugee camps in Bangladesh had settled in Hardah in January. Gazi’s DBSC had led 40 voluntary organisations in inviting Rohingyas to settle in Hardah if they felt threatened at
the present locations. They had also demanded citizenship for over 40,000 Rohingya refugees living in India.