Bangladesh Police arrests 11 for Indian enclave attack

DHAKA - Bangladesh Police have reportedly detained eleven persons for burning over 200 houses in an Indian enclave on the country’s border with India after some Indians allegedly killed a Bangladeshi.

According to the BBC, residents reportedly refused to return the body of a Bangladeshi villager allegedly killed by the Indians in Garati, the Indian enclave. About 2,000 people live in the enclave, which is surrounded by the Bangladeshi district of Panchagarh.

Indians have alleged that the intruder from Bangladesh was a robber, a claim that was denied by villagers from a neighbouring area.

Hundreds of people were left with no choice but spend their nights outside as their homes were destroyed in the violence. Residents of the enclave have reportedly claimed that they had lost household goods and other valuable things in the mob attack.

According to the recent reports, only half of the population has returned to the area so far.

“Normalcy is slowly returning to the area. We have deployed additional forces to prevent further violence,” the BBC quoted Shahriar Rahman, a senior police official in the district of Panchagarh, as saying.

There has been no comment yet from the Indian side on the incident, the report said.

This is the first major attack on an Indian enclave in many years, which has once again highlighted the tense relations in the border areas.

Both the countries share a border of more than 4,100 kilometres (2,550 miles).

There are more than 100 Indian enclaves inside Bangladeshi territory and about 50 Bangladeshi enclaves in India, which gives shelter to thousands of people. (ANI)