Guwahati: 70,000 illegal migrants untraceable

Guwahati: The country’s first detention centre, under directions from Union home ministry, was set up in Assam’s Goalpara district in 2008-09 following complaints against Bangladesh, which was not accepting those declared foreigners in Assam.

It is significant that at least 70,000 who declared illegal migrants in Assam vanished even before they could be deported back.

The Assam government, in its affidavit to the Supreme Court, has admitted that 70,000 individuals, who were declared foreigners by the Tribunal, remain untraceable.

“They have blended with the local population,” Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had submitted before a bench, headed by Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi in April.

The then Assam government, headed by Tarun Gogoi, had published a white paper where in it said that various Tribunals between 1985 and July 2012 had declared 61,774 persons as foreigners. But barely two months later, Gogoi said that there was not a single Bangladeshi national in Assam.

Referring to the situation based on which the detention centre was formed as a means to probe into angles on how ‘declared’ foreigners were vanishing into thin air, security sources said that detention centres were also meant to confine convicts under Passport Act.

In July 2009, then revenue minister Bhumidhar Barman had informed the state Assembly that two detention camps would be set up to house illegal immigrants. They were to come up at Mancachar and Mahisashan.

Assam currently has six detention camps. All have been set up inside jails at Goalpara, Kokrajhar, Tezpur, Jorhat, Dibrugarh and Silchar districts, said sources in the home department, which referred to a 2008 home ministry letter that started the process.

In  2014, the Narendra Modi government also wrote to all state governments for setting up detention centres. In 2018, the Modi government approved building a huge detention centre in Assam’s Matia Goalpara district. The state government had, in 2017, sanctioned 20 bighas of land for the Matia detention centre in 2017. Of course, it is yet to be functional.

The existing detention centres house around 1,000 foreigners even though Tribunals have declared over 85,000 persons as foreigners over the years.

The Matia centre, which can accommodate 3,000 inmates will have a hospital, an auditorium, a common kitchen and 180 toilets, when it starts functioning. The Supreme Court has ruled this year that foreigners living in the country may be released on bail if he or she has completed three years at the detention centre. Pointing out that in 2005 when the Illegal Migrants (Determination by Tribunal) (IMDT) Act enacted in 1983 was struck down by the Supreme Court, security sources said that all India law — Foreigners Act was imposed to detect and deport illegal immigrants in Assam also.

However, the biggest challenge before the authorities has been in deporting those from Bangladesh.
 
Informing that there was also an “inhuman practice” of pushing illegal immigrants forcibly across the border by Border Security Forces (BSF), security sources said that the “push back” policy was followed until 2013. Dhaka has always been reluctant to take back their citizens and in a majority of cases, it was found that individuals or families pushed back to Bangladesh would make their way into India from different routes, sources said.In order to resolve the issue, India and Bangladesh agreed to formulate a protocol for deportation of those declared foreigners by Indian courts. Informing that a person who has been declared foreigner  by the Foreigners’ Tribunal is sent to detention centre, security sources said.

They added that the border police, which is the second line of defence along the International Border with Bangladesh in Assam, forwards detailed information of a foreign national, confined at the detention centre, to the BSF, which, in turn, shares it with its Bangladesh counterparts.

When the border police come across a declared foreigner in Assam they send the details to Dhaka for ground verification. Once the verification report is approved and linkages of declared foreigners in the country are found, Bangladesh Border Guards agree to accept the deportation.Asserting that some of the declared foreigners do not disclose their actual addresses and linkages, security sources said that in such cases if ground verification fails, Bangladesh refuses to take such individuals back.

During the long process of judicial scrutiny as well as deportation after verification, the declared foreigners are kept confined at detention centres.