Spare the Hindu Refugees in Orissa by Deepak Kumar Rath The deportation of Bangladeshis is a raging issue in Orissa. The Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik seems to be very keen to repatriate them to Bangladesh. Ironically the Hindu refugees are also being targeted and are now being served quit-India notices although they have been living in India since before 1971. Thousands of Muslim infiltrators residing in Nawarangpur, Rajnagar (Kendrapara) and Malkanagiri are allegedly creating tension between the tribals aid the Hindu refugees. They are also involved in antinational activities in the border areas of southern Orissa and coastal Orissa. The agony of the Hindu refugees has never been addressed to. They want the State Chief Minister to go into the root of the problem. The Hindu refugees demand justice from the Government so that deportation is strictly in accordance with law. The successive Congress Governments treated them as mere vote-banks. The blind eye of the administration has helped in creating a number of infiltrator colonies in southern districts like Malkanagiri, Nawarangpur and Rajnagar. The Muslim infiltrators, the police has found, indulge in anti-national activities and keep close contacts with ISI. The detection of illegal radio stations and the arrest of a few suspects in the Rajnagar area of Kendrapara district on May 13, this year have brought to light the activities of infiltrators from Bangladesh and the security breaches made in the vicinity of sensitive defence installations. It is suspected that the transmission centres were set up by Pakistan intelligence posts near the Wheeler Islands using human intelligence operatives. It is also suspected that the radio stations were used to disseminate coded information within a limited radius to some infiltrators, who are suspected to be in the payrolls of foreign intelligence agencies. In India there are officially one crore and twenty lakh infiltrators but unofficially there are about three crore Bangladeshi Muslims. The Bangladeshis who came to India before 1971 are considered to be refugees by the Indian Government. The Orissa Government identified three thousand Hindu refugees and deported 21 of them straight-away In the first phase the Orissa Government has identified 530 Hindu refugees in Umarkot and Raighar, 530 in Malkanagiri and served quit-India notices to 108 in Raighar, Umarkot and 70 in Malkanagiri. But the State Government, it appears, does not pay any attention to the Bangladeshi infiltrators, whose numbers are alarmingly swelling. At the coastal belt of Jagatsinghpur, Kendrapara, Baleswar, Puri and Bhubaneswar, there is a large number of Bangladeshi Muslims. They are engaged in various occupations such as netting the breed of prawn, manufacturing leather items and ferry from village to village. The 'State Home Department has hinted that these Bangladeshis are engaged in anti-national activities. According to media reports madarsas are mushrooming in West Bengal. The Chief Minister of West Bengal, Buddhadeb Bhattacharya had recently remarked that the madarsas are encouraging anti-national activities. Some of the madarsas are nerve-centres of ISI activities. Sources say that there is a deep conspiracy being hatched by the ISI and other fundamentalist Muslim organisations of Bangladesh and Pakistan to destabilize India's economy, security, culture, demography and democracy. What is happening to Hindus in Bangladesh is only too well known to be elaborated here. They are being tortured, their houses burnt and they are being deprived of education, employment and other fundamental rights. The Hindus are treated as second class citizens in Bangladesh. Therefore, there is an exodus of Hindus from Bangladesh to India which should be looked at from a humanitarian standpoint. Steps have to be taken against the infiltrators instead of deporting Hindu refugees. For the deportation of Hindus there has to be conducive environment in Bangladesh. The Government of India, International Human Rights Organisations and the Orissa Government should exert pressure on Bangladesh Government to welcome their Hindu citizens back and provide them a honourably living coalition.