Over 600 km of Indo-Bangla border unfenced despite poll promises
The fencing work was taken up in 1986. The Phase-I project has been completed in the year 2000 under which 854.35 km fence was erected.
Guwahati, Mar 23: Illegal migration from Bangladesh has been at the core of the political discourse in every election over the years, but despite poll promises by parties, over 600 km of the Indo-Bangla border still remains to be fenced, even 39 years after the project began.
Of the 4,096 km of the international border with the neighbouring country, around 3,232 km has been fenced, according to a report of the Parliamentary Committee on External Affairs.
About 689 km of the border remains to be fenced. A little over 174 km of this pending portion is riverine and therefore, not feasible to be fenced.
“About 690 km or 700-odd km is a stretch where fencing can be done. These are areas where local authorities need to acquire land to enable fencing to be done.
“It is because these are also populated areas in certain cases,” the report quoted the Foreign Secretary.
In the year 2014, the government told the Parliament that out of 3,359.59 km of sanctioned fencing work, 2,823.10 km has been completed. It means, after the BJP came to power, only around 409 km of fencing work was executed – translating into 40 km of fencing each year.
The fencing work was taken up in 1986. The Phase-I project has been completed in the year 2000 under which 854.35 km fence was erected.
If the total completed fencing work till 2014 is taken into account, around 100 km of fencing work was executed every year on an average.
In March, 2015, the government had told the Rajya Sabha that Phase-II of the project was targeted to be completed by March 2014. “However, the same has spilled over due to delay in land acquisition by the State government concerned, public protest, delay in forest/wildlife clearances, difficult terrain, prolonged monsoon season in the northeastern areas, etc.,” the then Minister of State for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju had stated.
In July 2016, the Parliament was again told that the ongoing fence work along the complete Indo-Bangladesh border is targeted for completion by March, 2019. Further, in the stretches in which site is not available, fence work will be completed in three years from the date of availability of site, the government had said.
Again in February 2025, Minister of State in the Ministry of Home Affairs Nityanand Rai, in a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha, stated that 3,232.218 km has been covered with fence and the challenges faced in completing the remaining feasible stretches relate to land acquisition, Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) objections, limited working season and landslide/marshy land.
India shares its longest international border with Bangladesh, making it the fifth longest border in the world. The states sharing a land border with Bangladesh are West Bengal (2,216.7 km), Assam (263 km), Meghalaya (443 km), Tripura (856 km) and Mizoram (318 km).