Many living in underprivileged conditions in less developed economies — in their pursuit to escape poverty, misery, hopelessness, joblessness, and strife — manage to reach new lands, one way or another.
Laws require that one travels or migrates to a country other than one’s own domicile by following certain protocols with proper documentation, ie, passport, visa. But in their desperation to leave their home countries and pursue a dream of better living in foreign lands, many are forced to endure perilous illegal means and routes.
There are groups involved in facilitating such transfers.
It is illegal, to be sure, but those who resort to such means to escape desperate situations are not necessarily criminals per se. There may be hundreds of different stories behind such escapes — each genuine and deeply human. These are often people living on the fringes of society.
How humanity treats them becomes a pressing question in today’s nation-states, divided by geography, borders, laws, passports, and visas. Nation after nation is now governed by governments with hearts of stone.
People, in desperation, who land on their shores are increasingly dehumanized, made victims of state-sponsored cruelty, and subjected to wholesale deportation — as if humanity has become an obsolete virtue.
What we are witnessing, with deep angst and concern, is a display of powerful states’ total disregard for law, humanity, and civility in their treatment of people from foreign countries. These so-called illegal migrants are no children of a lesser god. They may have reached new shores through unconventional channels, but surely, they deserve humane treatment.
They are victims of their destiny — ill-fated, but not hardened criminals to be herded into crammed airplanes, with hands and legs tied and shackled, and deported in the most inhumane fashion. They may be desperate, but they are not desperados — no hardened criminals.
Humanity’s treatment of humans is indeed complex, encompassing both profound kindness and immense cruelty. While compassion, empathy, and respect define our best interactions, violence, discrimination, and neglect cause immense suffering across communities worldwide. The way humans treat one another profoundly impacts well-being, societal stability, and economic productivity.
Some recent deportations of Bangladeshis and Indians from the United States, and of Rohingya refugees from India, are glaring examples of brazen disregard for civility and humanity. How could the civilized world treat human beings so cruelly?
Earlier this month, 30 Bangladeshi nationals were sent back by a chartered flight from the United States in handcuffs and shackles. The deportees were brought to the runway still bound in chains. The shackles were removed only before they were taken to the arrival gate. During this time, no one was allowed to approach them or take photographs.
Abdullah, a 22-year-old from Noakhali, said: “Throughout the journey, I was shackled like a marked criminal. Being sent back is already heartbreaking, but arriving chained like a terrorist made it even worse.”
Since US President Donald Trump began his second term, deportations of illegal immigrants have intensified. Over the past months, at least 180 Bangladeshis have been deported in several phases. Initially, deportees were not handcuffed or shackled, but on August 2, a military transport aircraft carried 39 Bangladeshis — including one woman — bound in chains to Dhaka. And again, on September 4, 30 more were handcuffed, shackled, and deported to Dhaka.
The deportees described enduring nearly 60 hours in chains, sitting in extreme pain, and surviving only on bread and water. Even toilet trips required escorting and re-shackling.
A similar deportation in 2016, when 27 Bangladeshis were sent back in handcuffs, sparked strong reactions in Bangladesh, raising human rights concerns and prompting discussions between Dhaka and US authorities. The most unfortunate development this time is that we have heard of no such communications taking place between Dhaka and Washington, even though deportations in inhumane conditions have intensified.
The United States is also deporting Indians staying illegally, but we have learned that India’s foreign office is at least raising the issue with the US government, requesting that its citizens not be mistreated during deportation.
In February this year, the Indian foreign minister issued a statement in parliament a day after a US military flight brought back 104 Indians accused of entering the US illegally. One deportee told the BBC they had been handcuffed throughout the 40-hour flight, sparking widespread criticism.
As we know, an overwhelming majority of Rohingya — forced out of Myanmar in 2017 — have since taken refuge in Bangladesh. Despite the strain on its economy, an already overpopulated Bangladesh has hosted this ill-fated refugee population, often at great cost to local host communities.
Only a small segment of the Rohingya population — estimated at around 20,000 — sought shelter in India, but Indian authorities have expelled scores of them to Bangladesh and Myanmar. Worse still, international media and rights groups reported that many were forced onto a ship and then made to jump into the sea, swimming ashore near Launglon township in Myanmar’s Tanintharyi Region.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) stated in late August: “Indian authorities have expelled scores of ethnic Rohingya refugees to Bangladesh and Myanmar without rights protection since May 2025.” It said India arbitrarily detained several hundred more, mistreating some of them.
If the HRW report is accurate, India — under the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) — has initiated a campaign to expel Rohingya and Bengali-speaking Muslims as “illegal immigrants.” Those expelled to Bangladesh included at least 192 Rohingya refugees registered with the United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR). The Indian authorities also placed 40 Rohingya refugees on a ship near the Myanmar coast and forced them to swim ashore. Dozens more have fled to Bangladesh to avoid the crackdown.
HRW interviewed nine Rohingya men and women in the Cox’s Bazar refugee camps in Bangladesh who had recently arrived from India. Six who had been expelled in May alleged that Indian authorities assaulted them and seized their money, mobile phones, and UNHCR registration cards. The other three fled to Bangladesh — one each from Jammu and Kashmir, Andhra Pradesh, and Delhi — fearing arbitrary detention after police threatened them.
India has taken the issue of expelling “illegal migrants” so far that it has not only pushed out Rohingya but also some Bengali-speaking Indians into Bangladesh.
Bangladesh authorities raised the issue at different levels of diplomatic engagement with Delhi, but India’s frenzied moves also angered many within India, particularly in West Bengal, where Bengali is spoken. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee even led a massive rally in Kolkata this July, demanding an end to the harassment of Bengali-speaking people under Delhi’s drive against so-called illegal migrants.
The recent deportation of 40 Rohingya refugees from Delhi is a telling example of human cruelty — a cruelty that knows no bounds. One deportee, Syed Noor, told the BBC how Indian authorities hauled them from Delhi, transferred them to the Andamans by airplane, and then forced them onto a 14-hour ship journey by an Indian naval vessel toward Myanmar’s territorial waters.
Once the ship approached Myanmar’s shoreline, they were herded into two small boats. Noor said they were left floating in the sea for seven hours with their hands tied before being ordered to jump into the water one by one and swim ashore. The BBC reached out to Indian authorities for comment on this inhumane treatment, but they declined to respond.
Migrants and refugees are not such by choice but often by external forces beyond their control. They are powerless people. Modern states, with their governments and vast security apparatus, are powerful — perhaps too powerful.
Unless we establish rules of the game based on minimum standards of sanity, civility, and human dignity, the maltreatment of powerless people at the hands of powerful states will continue — contradicting the 21st-century civilization we claim to uphold.
As Martin Luther King, Jr famously said: “The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.” Do we want to go down in history as the silent good people? The choice is ours. All it takes is to act, and act now. Let us raise humanity’s voice against cruelty.
Reaz Ahmad is Editor, Dhaka Tribune.
