The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday conducted raids in connection with a money laundering case linked to the alleged illegal entry of Bangladeshi nationals in alliance-backed Jharkhand and West Bengal six days ahead of the first phase of polling in 20 assembly constituencies in the former.

Out of these two neighboring states, the ED’s Jharkhand office conducted searches at 17 sites. This probe comes at a time when Jharkhand is preparing for its assembly elections, with polls starting on November 13 and the second phase on November 20. Also, in West Bengal, six assembly seats have been put up for by-election at the same time.

The ED had started the questioning in September after having filed a case under the PMLA after learning about the trafficking and Illegal immigration of some Bangladeshi women, especially in Jharkhand. As per the details available, the case was taken up after a woman, who, it is said, had entered India from Bangladesh with the help of the traffickers, filed a complaint.

She had allegedly singled out five or six women whom the police later arrested in a sting operation at a resort. This woman had escaped a similar establishment before fleeing to the police. In the course of the investigation, one woman was caught with a fake Aadhaar card, which strengthened the impression of the existence of a mutual trafficking network.

The issue has also been used extensively in the recent elections by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and the senior leadership of the BJP has accused the Jharkhand state government of permitting cross-border infiltration, which, according to the BJP, changes the demography of the tribal regions, particularly the Santhal Pargana and Kolhan tracts.

Such allegations have given a political twist to the operations of the ED, stressing the issue of a possible demographic transformation of the tribal areas due to unabated cross-border infiltration.

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