UP cop reprimanded after ‘Bangladeshi detector’ device video sparks outrage

The station house officer (SHO) of the Kaushambi police station in Uttar Pradesh's Ghaziabad was reprimanded by senior officers after videos surfaced on social media showing him purportedly tying a device to a man and claiming it had identified the person as a Bangladeshi national.

ACP (Assistant Commissioner of Police) Abhishek Srivastava, under whose jurisdiction the police station falls, said the SHO had been warned and cautioned against adopting such methods in future.

“The officer has been admonished for adopting wrong tactics,” Srivastava said, adding that while the SHO was attempting to mount “psychological pressure” on the man and his daughter to elicit the truth, the method used was unacceptable.

According to police sources, the incident occurred on 23 December when the SHO, Ajay Sharma, was conducting a search and verification drive in shanties in the Kaushambi area. During the operation, he questioned a man and his daughter about their native place.

The girl reportedly told the police that the family hailed from Araria district in Bihar and showed documents stored on her mobile phone to support her claim. She also stated that the family had been living in the Kaushambi shanties since 1986.

Despite this, the SHO allegedly accused them of lying and claimed they were from Bangladesh, the sources said. He then tied a device around the waist of the girl’s father and asserted that the machine had “identified” them as Bangladeshi nationals — a claim that has no scientific or legal basis.

Videos of the episode quickly circulated online, triggering criticism and raising questions over police conduct and the use of intimidation during verification exercises. Following the backlash, senior officers stepped in and issued a formal warning to the SHO, making it clear that such practices would not be tolerated.

Police officials said internal instructions have been reiterated to ensure that identity verification is carried out strictly as per law, without harassment or use of coercive or misleading methods.

With PTI inputs