India and Bangladesh will have their every other year DG-level border talks in Dhaka next month. Official sources said Thursday that the talks will be about stopping a range of crimes that happen across the border and how to make it easier for their security forces and agencies to work together.
Border Security Force (BSF) Director General Nitin Agrawal will lead a group of people to Bangladesh for the meeting, which will take place from March 5–9.
It will be the 54th time that the BSF and the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) have met to talk.
There will be talks at the BGB offices in Dhaka’s Pilkhana.
The Bangladeshi group will be led by BGB DG Maj Gen Mohammad Ashrafuzzaman Siddiqui. They said that people from the two countries’ anti-drug and other agencies, as well as the home and foreign affairs ministries, will be at the talks.
A senior Union home ministry official said that both sides will talk about a number of border management issues. These include taking steps to stop Bangladeshi criminals from assaulting and attacking BSF officers and civilians, working together to stop crimes like smuggling of goods and fake Indian currency along this front, making the coordinated border management plan (CBMP) better, and stopping illegal building along the border fence.
The BSF protects the 4,096 km front that India shares with Bangladesh on the eastern side of the country.
From 1975 to 1992, DG-level border talks happened every year. In 1993, they were changed to happen every other year, with each side taking turns going to the national cities of New Delhi and Dhaka.
In June 2023, the last talks took place in Delhi.
The officer said that the US and the UK have good links with each other and with the forces. This meeting is meant to strengthen these ties.
Official numbers show that the BSF caught more than 3,342 Bangladeshi residents at the border in 2023. This was the most in the last six years.
According to the data, 77 BSF officers were hurt in attacks by criminals from Bangladesh and India last year. This is up from 43 and 64 cases, respectively, in 2022 and 2021.
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