Staff Reporter :Police on Thursday arrested 44 Nepalese nationals from DOHS at Pallabi of Mirpur in the capital city on charge of illegally staying in the country.Dadan Fakir, the Officer-in-Charge of Pallabi Police Station, said, two Bangladeshis had also been picked up for helping the Nepalese to stay in Bangladesh. The arrested Nepalese worked in various restaurants and enterprises in thecity. They entered the country with tourist visas. Though the tenure of the visas expired on July 19, they have not applied for renewal thereof. So they were staying illegally, sources said. The caretaker of the house Jalal Ahmed Mian said, as the DOHS authority instructed us not to rent quarters to the bachelors, we asked them to leave the house. They agreed to leave by 31st July, but they did not do that in the end. One of the security officials of the DOHS told The New Nation, that the Nepalese hired the residence on May 22. But they repeatedly failed to submit their legal documents to the security officials. In that circumstances, the officials informed police on Thursday through the Army. OC of Pallabi Police Station, Dadan Fakir, said, the Nepalese had been asked to stay in the building they lived. They might be handed over to the Nepalese embassy in Dhaka, he added. He said, a Bangladeshi citizen named Waliullah hired the DOHS’s quarters for the Nepalese. Police are preparing to file a case against Waliullah.Sources said, the illegally staying foreign nationals commit crimes like printing and releasing fake US and Bangladeshi currencies, money laundering, drug and human trafficking, credit card forgery and VOIP. There are about one lakh and 25 thousand foreigners in the country. But there is no real official statistics as to how many foreigners are illegally staying in the country.Most of the foreigners are from Uganda, Liberia, Congo, Cameroon, Mozambique, Niger, Ivory coast and Central African Republic. Some others are from India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Myanmar. Sources said, most of the foreigners arrived in the country with tourist and sports visas. But they do not leave the country with the expiry of visas. Then tghey become involved in many illegal jobs. The foreigners have some local agents. With the help of the local agents, they hire houses at Uttara, Gulshan and Rampura. There are lots of allegations with the immigration authority against the illegally staying foreigners.Police said, they have raided in various areas to search and arrest illegal foreigners at last 2014. But then the process did not continue.
