Staff Reporter
GUWAHATI: Taking a non-compromising stance on illegal migrants, Chief Minister Dr Himanta Biswa Sarma said today that the government decided to push them back within a week of FTs (foreigners tribunals) declaring them foreigners.
The Chief Minister said that the stand the government has taken now will make the process of deportation swift. “In the past few months, we’ve pushed back around 2,000 infiltrators to Bangladesh. With this process, we can deport 10,000 to 50,000 infiltrators to Bangladesh per year,” he said.
The Chief Minister said that earlier the government had no clear-cut apparatus for the deportation of declared foreigners, leading it to keep them in detention camps for months and then go through the meandering course of approaching the Central government for deportation. “For its part, the Central Government would contact their Bangladesh counterpart for the verification of the addresses of the declared foreigners. Deportation was possible only after getting the nod from Bangladesh. Hundreds of such requests to Bangladesh have been pending,” he said.
The Chief Minister said that for various reasons the power that the district administrations have to expel immigrants instantly under the Immigrants (Expulsion from Assam) Act, 1950, was not implemented in the state. “However, the Supreme Court of India mentioned in a hearing on the deportation of foreigners that the Immigrants (Expulsion from Assam) Act, 1950, is still valid in the expulsion of illegal immigrants. Recently the Assam government has invoked this Act and is pushing back infiltrators instantly,” the Chief Minister said.
The Chief Minister said that the policy of his government is ‘protecting identity’ and ‘development’. “If we lose our identity in the form of jati, mati and bheti, whom will our development works serve? Thus, our fight against illegal migrants and declared foreigners will continue,” he said.
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