Picked up for speaking Bengali: Inside Bengaluru’s Operation Mukta
Operation Mukta came after months of growing attention around alleged Bangladeshi illegal immigration in Bengaluru. Hindutva activists and social media influencers have repeatedly targeted Bengali-speaking migrant workers, alleging that they are undocumented Bangladeshis.
What happened during Operation Mukta in Bengaluru and what did the crackdown miss?
On August 8, police picked up hundreds of people from migrant settlements across Bengaluru as part of a drive to identify undocumented immigrants.
Workers told TNM that police checked their documents, phones, call records and private photographs. Some allege they were detained for hours or assaulted. But there is another story behind the crackdown, the trafficking and exploitation of undocumented Bangladeshi workers who are brought to Bengaluru and pushed into some of the city’s most precarious jobs.
Who brings them here? Who profits from their labour? And why are Indian workers from West Bengal and Assam being caught in the same crackdown?
TNM’s Shivani Kava and Anisha Sheth investigate Operation Mukta, migrant workers, trafficking and the politics of who gets labelled an “outsider”.
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