Hussain Ali from Hakimpur in North 24 Parganas — where the 40-feet-wide river, Sonai, forms the border between India and Bangladesh — is a crusader dissuading local youth from smuggling cattle. Once a handler (local jargon for those who smuggle cattle across the border), the 30-year-old left the profession after being beaten up for demanding better pay.

The disillusioned Ali is now a poster boy of reform in a region that once thrived on cattle smuggling. He is among the growing number of locals who are shunning the trade. They now prefer to be migrant labourers in West Asian countries, or opt for respectable jobs as a “civic police volunteer”.

One of them is Gopal Ghosh of Angrail, a border point in West Bengal. He became a labourer in Saudi Arabia earning ₹17,000 to ₹21,000 a month. As a handler, each consignment of two cows — as the practice is to blend in with farmers who take animals to work — fetched him ₹500- 700. Some 30-odd consignments would have get him up to ₹20,000 a month. His earnings might not have increased by much in Saudi Arabia, but Ghosh is happy about being in a legal profession. "No more do I have the tension of BSF jawans picking me up for queries. I sleep without a worry."

Angrail, which has a riverine border of 3.5 km, used to flourish on cattle smuggling. Nearly, 2,000-2,500 animals would crossover every day. Today the number has come down to 500. Overall, in the South Bengal division, the BSF has seized around 36,000 animals till mid-August this year.

An improvement, from the nearly 92,000 animals seized in 2015 and 89,000 in 2016. Before 2015, the numbers ran into lakhs.

The story is same in other border areas in West Bengal that were used for smuggling cattle. What really sounded the death knell on the trade?

Those in the trade say two routes are taken by the smugglers (see map).

A cow, which is not producing milk, can be procured for ₹500 from Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh or Bihar. When the cattle reach bordering villages, they are sheltered with villagers, who are paid up to ₹200 per animal. If BSF soldiers come questioning, villagers claim that the animals are their livestock.

Smuggling blossomed irrespective of religious taboos. In fact, Hindu identities of handlers were an easy getaway. It was easier for a Hindu to convince a law enforcer by claiming that the cows are being domesticated and that they are not for trade.

That is why a village like Angrail, where most are Hindus, thrived on cattle smuggling. The prosperity is visible in two-storey houses with gardens. On the other hand, neighbouring villages that depend on agriculture for income are marked with thatched houses.

It goes without saying that smugglers took advantage of loopholes in Indian laws. The law does not ban movement of cattle from one State to another. The law mandates that not more than nine animals be carried in a truck. So smugglers used small vehicles carrying up to six animals

Law enforcing agencies are not surehow many times the cattle change hands to avoid scrutiny. But, till they reach transit points like Islampur or Kishanganj in Bihar, around ₹5,000 is paid as transportation per animal. Once they reach these transit points, animals were then put in smaller vehicles.

Apart from North and South Bengal, Tripura, Assam and Meghalaya frontiers are the major cattle exit points in India.

“Even if trucks were apprehended on highways, drivers would say they were taking animals to a cattle haat (local market). If numbers exceed permissible limits, bribes were paid,” say people in the trade. They didn't want to be identified.

By the time the cattle crossed over the border and entered Bangladesh, each animal commanded a price of about ₹40,000. This included payments for transportation, handler charges, bribes and a good profit margin.

Cattle smuggling in India is pegged at ₹20,000 crore a year, say Customs department officials. There are no official numbers available. According to the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Exports Development Authority, export of buffalo meat accounted for ₹26,681.56 crore in 2015-16.

While killing a milch cow in India attracts a jail sentence, cattle slaughter is banned in several States. Moreover, export of cow or ox meat is also illegal.

But despite legislation, cattle cross over to Bangladesh, a major beef exporting and consuming nation. Though the demand for beef in Bangladesh is quite high, supply is limited. However, one must understand the scenario here. Bangladesh, to ease the supply-demand gap, does not treat cattle smuggled from India as a crime. It is a legalised trade there.

In 1993, Bangladesh gave the cattle trade a legal status by making it a source of revenue. A cattle “smuggler” becomes a “trader”, after he plays a “nominal fee”. Beef, bone china products, leather — the neighbouring country thrives on all these.

But things changed after 2015.

The smuggling story took a twist after Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh visited the border areas in 2015. He told the BSF to step-up its vigil of cattle smuggling.

For starters, BSF stepped up its intelligence gathering and maintenance of cow registers. Personnel in plain clothes started using people like Ali to gather info and take action against those keeping cattle illegally. “At night truck-loads of cows would be coming in through the highways. With increased vigil and check posts coming up, the numbers have fallen drastically,” says Basudeb Ghosh, President of a local market committee in Angrail. According to PSR Anajaneyulu, IG –South Bengal of BSF, the force doubled the manpower patrolling outposts, and repaired old, worn out fences and set up new ones.

Speed boats are now used for vigil along riverine borders, and ditches — as deep as 15 feet — have been dug up in places. “Once the cattle fall in these ditches, it’s impossible for them to climb out. This, to a certain extent, has deterred handlers,” claims a BSF official.

The other successful action was to remove illegal and make-shift cattle markets (called cattle haats) from areas along the border. Basirhat, the neighbouring subdivision to Bongaon, now houses the legal cattle market. “We have strict vigilance along the highway to ensure there is no diversion of traded cattle by the smugglers,” says a patrolling BSF jawan.

What has also come in handy for the BSF is the growing sense of disenchantment amongst the local youth in the region towards cattle smuggling. “Those between 18-35 years want a respectable profession,” says a senior BSF official. This is where the agency started implementing its confidence building measures — like football matches, cultural programs, computer training — to break barriers.

As BSF along with the local police upped the ante against cattle smugglers, handlers like Ali started demanding more money. Numbers dwindled, payments became irregular, handlers were unhappy. And many like Ali, quit the trade.

Locals in Bongaon — one of the bordering districts of West Bengal that is famous as a cattle smuggling conduit — claim a “drastic reduction” in the number of cattle transported.

There is also another factor. People in the region talk in hushed tones about g aurakshaks. Rising instances of cow vigilantism and the associated lynch-mob syndrome have created a fear amongst the transporters. Now few rent out their trucks to transport cattle.

In August, two suspected cow thieves, both Muslims, were lynched in the Jalpaiguri district.

“The fear of cow vigilante groups is undeniable. The number of cattle being transported to the state, through highways, has dropped,” a senior police official in West Bengal pointed out.

The Bangladesh government, keen to continue good relations with its Indian counterpart, is also looking to control the smuggling. Dhaka also used the opportunity — of declining cattle smuggling — to encourage the local cattle industry for last three years. The Bangladeshi animal husbandry lobby is now working as a pressure group against the illegal trade.

Since the stakes were high, cattle smuggling had over the years evolved into a criminal enterprise with several networks. The kingpins have never been caught but evidence suggests cattle smuggling to be part of a much bigger racket, including that of fake currency.

In April 2013, the National Investigating Agency, set up to investigate terrorism-related cases, filed a charge-sheet against a group of persons smuggling fake currency to fund Hizb-ul Mujahideen , the Kashmir-based terror outfit. One of those charge-sheeted was a Bangladeshi having links to the cattle smuggling trade.

“Cattle smuggling may have gone down. But peripheral crime has gone up,” says BJP leader, Madhusudhan Mondal. For instance, gold smuggling along the region is on a rise. Compared to the 24,300 grams of gold seized in 2015, by mid-August this year, the BSF had seized close to 28,000 grams of gold.

Despite the recent successes in limiting it, the reality is that cattle smuggling continues. A recent incident of a 45-year-old BSF jawan being run over while trying to stop a vehicle carrying cattle near the India-Bangladesh border, only confirms this premise.

What now has changed, after the intense policing, is the mode of transport. Instead of trucks, hatchback cars are used. The other big difference is calves are preferred. Up to five calves are dumped in these small cars and carried towards the border villages.

“It is small cars that are intercepted nowadays. And most of these carry calves,” says the inspector-in-charge of a local police station along the India-Bangladesh border. The demand for calves is not just for meat, but, also for the local animal husbandry industry in Bangladesh.

The solution, as various quarters suggest, is to legalise cattle trade. But, then, cattle is an emotive subject in India.