Neighbor India quietly fencing out Bangladesh

SUJATPUR, Bangladesh — Everyone knew it was out there somewhere, an invisible line that cut through a cow pasture and, at least in theory, divided one nation from another.

But no one saw it as a border. It was just a lumpy field of grass, uneven from the hooves of generations of cattle. Villagers crossed back and forth without even thinking about it.

Today, no one can ignore it.

In a construction project that will eventually reach across 2,050 miles, hundreds of rivers and long stretches of forests and fields, India has been quietly sealing itself off from Bangladesh, its much poorer neighbor.

Sections totaling about 1,550 miles have been built the past seven years.

In Sujatpur, a poor farming village, the frontier is now defined by two rows of 10-foot-high barbed-wire barriers, the posts studded with ugly spikes the size of a toddler's fingers.

A smaller fence, and miles of barbed-wire coils, fill the space in between.

The expanse of steel, set into concrete, spills off toward the horizon in both directions.

In the United States, the decision to fence 700 miles of the Mexican border triggered months of political debate ranging across issues from immigration reform to the environmental impact.

When Israel announced it would build a 425-mile barrier around the West Bank, an international outcry erupted.

Little protest

But there has been barely a ripple over India's far larger project, launched in earnest in 2000 amid growing fears in New Delhi about illegal immigration and cross-border terrorism.

The Bangladeshi government made a few complaints — the fence was like an insult, as if their country was a plague that needed to be quarantined — but soon gave up.

There's no clear completion date for the $1.2 billion project, which when finished will nearly encircle Bangladesh — leaving open only its seacoast and its border of about 200 miles with Myanmar.

India believes some Indian militant groups are based in Bangladesh, a charge the Bangladeshi government denies.

But the larger fear in New Delhi is that illegal immigrants will flood out of Bangladesh, one of the world's most crowded countries.

Its 150 million people, about half the U.S. population, jam an area the size of Wisconsin, and the low-lying land is prone to devastating floods and typhoons. Scientists also warn that rising sea levels from global warming could force millions from their homes.

Some experts estimate as many as 20 million Bangladeshis are in India illegally, most crammed into large cities or in shantytowns just over the border.

Life transformed

In villages like Sujatpur, India's fears have changed everything.

It began about a year ago, when Indian soldiers and construction workers arrived on their side of the border without warning and announced the frontier was closed.

Until then, people from this village of thatch-roofed huts, barely 200 yards from India, crossed the border daily to graze cattle, see friends or — since this part of India is one of the few that remains heavily forested — cut firewood and bamboo. Indians came to shop in Bangladeshi markets.

The fence is being built on Indian soil, though, and there's nothing that can be done about it on this side.

"They're big and we're small, and so they can do this to us," said Sulaiman, a Bangladeshi border guard with only one name. "It's insulting."