A Bangladeshi national Shanta Paul, a 28-year-old model and actress was arrested in Kolkata, West Bengal for illegally residing in India while possessing multiple forged Indian identity documents, including two Aadhaar cards, a voter ID, and a ration card. The incident not only exposes a dangerous nexus of document fraud but also highlights the alleged complicity or wilful blindness of the West Bengal government in enabling Bangladeshi infiltration through systemic manipulation of civic records.
Acting on a specific intelligence tip, the Anti-Rowdy Squad of Kolkata Police arrested Shanta Paul from a rented apartment in Bijoygarh, Jadavpur, a locality in South Kolkata. She had been staying there since 2023 with a male companion. Shanta, a resident of Barisal, Bangladesh, is a known figure in the Bangladeshi glamour circuit and had participated in the Miss Asia Global contest in Kerala in 2019.
However, what the police found in her possession painted a far darker picture than a model overstaying her welcome. During the raid and subsequent search of her residence, Kolkata Police seized:
Two Aadhaar cards one with a Kolkata address, the other from Burdwan (issued in 2020)
- An Indian voter ID card (EPIC)
- A ration card under the West Bengal public distribution system
- Multiple Bangladeshi passports
- A Bangladeshi secondary school admit card
- An employee ID from Regent Airways (Bangladesh)
She failed to produce any valid Indian visa or official entry document. When questioned, she could not give any convincing explanation for her possession of these highly regulated Indian identity documents.
According to police sources, the documents recovered from Shanta Paul were genuine not forged in the traditional sense but fraudulently issued through official Indian government systems. The Kolkata Police have written to the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to investigate how and under whose credentials Aadhaar cards were issued. Simultaneously, they have contacted the National Election Commission and the West Bengal Food Department to inquire how the voter and ration cards were approved despite her being a foreign national.
This points to a much deeper rot: the possible institutional facilitation of document fraud by local bureaucrats, middlemen, and politically connected networks.
This is not the first time Bangladeshi nationals have been caught with Indian documents in Bengal. In fact, security agencies have long warned about a thriving ecosystem of document forgery in the state, particularly in border districts like Malda, North 24 Parganas, and Murshidabad. But Shanta Paul’s case is uniquely dangerous due to her high-profile background and the authenticity of the documents recovered.
What is now emerging is that certain local networks, allegedly backed by political interests, are working actively to provide identity shields to illegal migrants from Bangladesh—transforming them into Indian citizens on paper within months.
The deeper issue lies in why this document fraud continues unchecked. Multiple political observers and former security officials believe the answer lies in West Bengal’s long history of vote bank politics involving illegal Bangladeshi immigrants.
The Trinamool Congress (TMC) government, like its Marxist predecessor, has been repeatedly accused of harbouring and naturalising Bangladeshi infiltrators for electoral gain. The strategy is straightforward:
- Help infiltrators settle illegally.
- Issue ration cards, Aadhaar, and voter IDs through compromised officials.
- Include them in electoral rolls.
- Consolidate them as a loyal vote bank under the banner of minority rights and welfare.
Police are now investigating whether Shanta Paul’s stay in India had deeper implications beyond mere overstaying. Her high mobility, cross-border travel, and access to privileged platforms like beauty pageants and airline staff IDs suggest she may have been part of a larger human trafficking or espionage network.
“You don’t just get Aadhaar and EPIC by accident. Someone powerful and organized has to be behind this,” said a senior retired intelligence officer. Shanta Paul has been remanded to police custody until August 8.
