Ground report: On Indo-Bangladesh border, Changrabandha is both trade and terror spot

ByKamalika Sen, Zee News Network

Coochbihar in North Bengal is a strategically important place for India. It is the gateway of Assam, Bhutan, Bangladesh. It has a550km border with Bangladesh out of which about 200 km has no fencing.

Changrabandha here is said to be one of the important integrated check posts through which over a lakh people travel to and fro to Bangladesh and more than 100 trucks ploy to Bangladesh every day.

Time and again, the Central Government has pointed out that Bengal has become a transit route for terrorists. Therefore, we planned to check the infrastructure and security measures of the northernmost important border, Changrabandha.

Changrabandha is two hours away from Siliguri. The Changrabandha station is the last station of India.

As we reached Changrabandha, we saw two tin-roofed huts standing desolate on the border. Inside the larger one, Bangladeshis were jostling one another to make to the immigration officer’s table.

Indian passport holders had to report to two immigration officials, sitting outside the second hut with a swarm of unlicensed money changers for company.

In the absence of x-ray machines, the officer goes through every piece of the luggage, leaving you to repack them with various hues of middlemen and curious onlookers gawking.

"Poor infrastructure has totally chocked the post here. Even now, people have to stand under trees with the passports and visas to carry out formalities. People have repeatedly expressed anguish at the Centre for not developing the infrastructure here, it has now become the terror corridor. State Government, several times, have written to them, but the centre has done nothing," says North Bengal's development minister, Rabin Deb.

Choton Das, a resident of this place, came and expressed their concern to us, they feel threatened to stay here, "You see there is no x-ray machine here, look at the condition of the immigration office... is it possible to check the trucks manually? Trucks go from here and we know a lot of illegal stuff too. Gold is smuggled from this place, we hear people going and coming at late night," he stated.

BSF is there but in comparison to the Petropole border, which is located in Bonga, less number of people are deployed here. BSF sources state there is no gate in this check post and less number of people deployed here is a huge problem.

Moreover, we met Riyaz Mia who came crossing the border from Bangladesh. Riyaz is a frequent visitor of India and shares that there is no place to sit this side and if medical patients come to India, there is no interim place where the patients can take rest.

Custom department officials state that their department is very much concerned about this region. They have sent a detailed report to the central government seeking infrastructural development.

This land port handles more than half, the nearly $6.5-billion, of the Indo-Bangla trade and a similar proportion of the 15 lakh people transiting between the two nations. But, this type of poor infrastructure is a cause of concern.

The Land Ports Authority under the Union Home Ministry decided to upgrade the Changrabandha Land Customs Station to a modern Integrated Check Post (ICP) in 2012 at an estimated cost of ₹64 crore.

The West Bengal government has also has made the Changrabandha Development Board, but the officials say it is not their arena to upgrade the infrastructure in this check post and they are waiting for the central government to act on the same.

Standing here in Changrabandha, one question that comes up is why the government, the agencies are not acting to the situation here. Blame games continue between the centre and the state about the illegal Bangladeshi migrants and terror route, still why no action? We hope things will change.