Assam steps up illegal foreigners' ‘pushback', kin move court

Time of India

a day ago

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Guwahati: Assam's BJP-led govt has accelerated the process of tracking down all individuals declared as illegal foreigners by Foreigners' Tribunals and is pushing them back to no-man's land between India and Bangladesh.
At least 49 such 'declared foreign nationals (DFN)' have been pushed back from western and southern Assam in two days on May 27 and 29, following which at least three different petitioners have separately moved the Supreme Court and Gauhati High Court seeking whereabouts of their family members, suspected to have been pushed back, and a halt to the ongoing drive.
CM Himanta Biswa Sarma on Friday said, "30,000 people after being declared as foreign nationals by various tribunals over the years have disappeared.
We have decided to speed up the process of detecting them, which was paused when the NRC was being updated. The moment we get them, we have to take action and we are working as per law."
Sarma said in the coming days, there will lot of pushbacks. He underlined that a declared foreigner has the scope of appealing in the high court or Supreme Court.
"Our procedure is a simple one — if one has not preferred an appeal in the higher court, his or her right to stay in India is forfeited.
But if a declared foreigner can show that he or she has made an appeal, we are not disturbing him," Sarma said.
"There are many who have shown the higher court's order. If judiciary has given a stay order (on their tribunal order declaring them as foreigner), we are respecting the judiciary and we have allowed such people to stay," Sarma said.
Sarma added that there are two types of illegal foreigners — one category is people who are coming in and the other category who have been declared as foreigner by tribunals.
"The Supreme Court (in February) has ordered that those declared as foreigners and have not made any appeal should be sent back by any means. Only yesterday, 35 Bangladeshis who came in few days ago were detected near the border with Meghalaya and in Silchar were immediate pushed back," Sarma said.
On Thursday, Gauhati high court issued notice to the state govt directing it to provide details on the whereabouts of two brothers, who were declared foreigners by a tribunal and subsequently released on conditional bail.
One Torap Ali, nephew of Abu Bakkar Siddik and Akbar Ali, in his petition in the high court, claimed that his family apprehends both his uncles 'may be in danger of being illegally pushed into Bangladesh'.
The duo was declared as foreigners by a tribunal in 2017 and were sent to the transit camp in Goalpara. They were released on bail in 2020 following the Supreme Court's directive that those who are in detention for over two years may be released on bail.
They were detained by police on May 24, the petitioner submitted and claimed that the authorities have refused to give details of the whereabouts of his two uncles. The court has posted the next date of hearing on June 4.
Similarly the Supreme Court on Friday said it will hear on Monday a habeas corpus petition filed by a 26-year-old man stating that his mother Monowara Bewa of Dhubri, also a declared foreigner, was detained by police on May 24 and since then her whereabouts are not known.
On the other hand, the All BTC Minority Students' Union (ABMSU) of Assam has also filed a petition in the Supreme Court highlighting the "grave violation of fundamental rights arising out of the ongoing deportation of Indian citizens under the guise of implementing" the apex court's Feb order.
The organization has appealed to the court to declare the push-back policy "without due process—including judicial declaration, MEA verification, and exhaustion of remedies" unconstitutional.
"This policy of push back— being executed in border districts like Dhubri, South Salmara, and Goalpara — is not only legally indefensible, but also threatens to render stateless numerous Indian citizens, especially those from poor and marginalised communities who were either declared foreigners ex-parte or have no access to legal aid to challenge their status,' the ABMSU stated in its petition.