Of chilli and stun grenades: India struggles to rein in border flows of cattle and Rohingya

India wants to deport about 40,000 Rohingya refugees who arrived in previous years, calling them a threat to national security

Stopping Rohingya refugees from crossing India’s porous eastern border with Bangladesh is straining the resources of guards battling to halt a flow of smuggled cattle in the opposite direction, security officials say.

More than half a million Muslim Rohingya, a stateless ethnic minority, have fled Myanmar for Bangladesh since violence erupted on Aug. 25, but it is not clear how many then sought to travel on to India.

Last month India ordered its border guards to use “rude and crude” methods, such as “chilli and stun grenades”, to block their entry.

But that directive clashes with another task India’s Hindu