Kolkata: Border Security Force (BSF) on February 1 described as "conspiracy" the attempt made by Bangladesh Rifles (BDR) to forcibly push 213 Bangladeshis across the border into India at Satgachi outpost in West Bengal's Coochbehar district even as tension continued to prevail along the Indo-Bangla international boundary with the border guards on alert.

BDR had plotted to infiltrate Bangladeshi nationals into India, which had been occurring in both the Southern and Northern frontiers for the last 10 days, a BSF spokesman alleged.

BSF, which stopped the Bangladeshis within five yards inside Indian territory along the zero line, dismissed as "bogus" the BDR claim that it had pushed back Bengali- speaking Indian Muslims.

"BDR played the same game of pushing Bangladeshis inside India on the false pretext of pushing back foreigners at Pushtighata in North 24-Parganas district," the spokesman said.

The Bangladeshis were taken into BSF custody at Mathabhanga and additional DIG (deputy inspector general) of North Bengal Frontier P P Gupta has been camping at Satgachi outpost, with the BSF-BDR stand-off creating a panic situation in and around the place, he said.

On sustained interrogation, the arrested infiltrators confessed that they were all Bangladeshi nationals and were forcibly pushed into India by the BDR at gun-point on January 31, he said.

BDR had claimed that it had pushed back Bengali-speaking Indian Muslims into Indian territory after they were detected as "non-Bangladeshis".

PTI