Bengali body calls for fencing along Nepal border

The Siliguri based Bengali body the Bangla O Bangla Bhasa Bachao Committee (BOBBC) has demanded the erection of barbed-fencing along the Indo-Nepal border alike the boundary with Bangladesh.The demand cropped up as one of the prime resolutions at the BOBBC convened citizens’ convention against the Gorkhaland demand held in Siliguri 17th November. The three-hour convention, was organised at the Kanchenjungha Stadium Hall in the town. “It has been unanimously resolved to create pressure upon the Union government to fence the whole Nepal border to check the unabated migration of scores of Nepalis into India everyday. Apart from serving a memorandum to the concerned authorities, we would also take up agitation programme on the demand soon,” the BOBBC president Dr Mukumdo Mazumdar said after the convention.It may be mentioned that, as of now, India shares a 1868 km long open border with Nepal spread over the five states of Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal and Sikkim. Other than the border fencing demand, the Bengali nationalist body also reiterated its pledge not to allow any further division of Bengal in the name of 'Gorkhaland', Kamtapur etc, abrogation of the Indo-Nepal Treaty of Peace and Friendship of 1950 and the identification of the alleged ‘Nepali infiltrators’ residing in Darjeeling. Writer Mr Gourishankar Bhattacharya, Mr Chinmoy Chakroborty, Mr Arun Lahiri and others were present at the convention.