Invisible journeys across India-Bangladesh borders and bubbles of corrupt networks: stories of cross-border rural-urban migration and economic linkages

Abstract

Drawing on ethnography and retrospective memories of peoples’ journey across the India-Bangladesh border, this chapter seeks to understand corrupt spaces and flows – process of their migration decision, networks, destinations, challenges, expectations and survival strategies in everyday life. The focus on journeying and methods of illegal and provisional migration from one country’s coastal zone to other country’s megacities can represent corrupt spaces from three perspectives - organised network of illegal migration, corrupt organizations at different scales and locations, and different bubbles of economies embedded in it. In doing so, this research shows the ‘circuits’ of corrupt spaces and economic activities through short-term and circulatory migration.