In a major policy shift, the newly formed West Bengal government has officially handed over an initial 75 acres of land to the Border Security Force (BSF) to facilitate the fencing of a critical 27-kilometer stretch along the India-Bangladesh border. The formal transfer took place at the state secretariat, Nabanna, where Chief Secretary Manoj Agrawal presented the land parcels to BSF Director General Praveen Kumar in the presence of Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari. The transferred property consists of 43 acres of directly purchased land across various districts and 31.9 acres of state-vested land. This land will be used both for erecting barbed-wire fencing and establishing essential BSF infrastructure, including border outposts.
Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari framed the decision as a vital step toward safeguarding national security, noting that while 1,600 kilometers of Bengal’s 2,200-kilometer international border are already secured, nearly 600 kilometers have remained dangerously unfenced. Adhikari launched a sharp critique against the previous Trinamool Congress (TMC) administration, accusing it of deliberately withholding the land for years due to “vote-bank politics and appeasement policies” despite repeated requests from Union Home Minister Amit Shah. He further noted that the mandatory district-level coordination meetings between the BSF, local police, and district magistrates—which had completely stopped under the previous government—have now been fully revived.
Alongside the land handover, the Chief Minister announced a strict new border management framework termed “detect, delete, and deport”. Under this newly enforced directive, state police will immediately arrest illegal immigrants who are not protected under the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) and hand them over directly to the BSF for deportation. BSF DG Praveen Kumar welcomed the rapid intervention, stating that the force is finally receiving the long-awaited administrative synergy required to seal the border effectively
