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New Delhi: Sixty-three Muslims in Assam are at high risk of deportation after the Indian Supreme Court directed the state government to begin the process of expelling them.<\/p>\nNew Delhi: Sixty-three Muslims in Assam are at high risk of deportation after the Indian Supreme Court directed the state government to begin the process of expelling them.<\/p>\n
According to Kashmir Media Service, families of those held in detention centers have strongly refuted claims that they are Bangladeshi foreigners, insisting on their Indian citizenship.<\/p>\n
The court reprimanded the government for not deporting 63 detainees, all Muslims, held in the Matia detention centre in the Goalpara district of Assam. The court\u2019s directions came as the Assam government filed an affidavit calling all these detainees \u201cBangladeshi nationals\u201d. The government said that they did not deport these detainees as the alleged foreigners did not give their addresses in the \u201cforeign country\u201d.<\/p>\n
On the contrary, these detainees have homes and families in India. A report by India-based Scroll.in found that 20 of the 63 detainees have challenged the order of the Foreigner\u2019s Tribunal declaring them \u201cforeigners\u201d in various courts including the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
The report tracked down the families of the seven detainees. All of them contested the claim of being foreigners by citing their documents and the presence of their ancestors in India for generations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey showed us documents that established they had been living in Assam for decades. They had legacy data which proved their Indian ancestry. They possessed land titles. Their names are featured on voter lists. They said they had voted in many elections. Six of the seven men even had their names included in the National Register of Citizens updated in Assam in 2019,\u201d noted the report.<\/p>\n
Out of 63 detainees, 27 people were sent to the detention centre last year in September. Sirajul Haque, a resident of Barpeta district, was among those held last year, 21 years after he was declared an illegal immigrant.<\/p>\n
Haque\u2019s brother, Abdul Majid, said: \u201cBut how can he be a foreigner? Our parents were born here. My mother\u2019s name is in the 1966 and 1971 voter lists.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to Majid, his brother had been voting in elections since 1989, had land titles in his name, had even been allotted a home under the PM Awas Yojana in 2018 \u2013 and been included in the National Register of Citizens.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe NRC authorities verified and checked pre-1971 documents meticulously multiple times. If we did not have any papers, how could they include my brother\u2019s name in the 2019 NRC?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n
Majid dismissed the Assam government\u2019s claim that Haque was from Bangladesh. \u201cWe have no one there, we have never even been there,\u201d he said in exasperation.<\/p>\n
His family then approached the Gauhati High Court to challenge the tribunal order. In order to do so, they had to lease their farmland, sell two of their cows, and take a loan of Rs 50,000 for the legal expenses, which amounted to at least Rs 1.2 lakh, according to Majid.<\/p>\n
Ishab Ali, who was recently released from the detention centre after getting bail from the Gauhati High Court, fears that he can be arrested again. Ali\u2019s name is also included in the 2019 National Register of Citizens.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t read or write. But I know that in 1983, the river Beki washed our homes at Ghilajari village and after that we shifted here to Noonmati. My mother\u2019s name is there in the 1985 voter list. My grandfather\u2019s name is in the 1951 NRC. We have land documents too,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow can they send him to Bangladesh?\u201d his wife Nazma Khatun asked. \u201cLet the Bangladeshi government provide a document to him saying he is a Bangladeshi, then only they can say that he is Bangladeshi.\u201d<\/p>\n
Similarly, family members of other detainees, 51-year-old Jahedul Islam, 65-year-old Makbul Hussain, 65-year-old Ketab Ali, and 75-year-old Ibrahim Ali, refuted the allegation of being foreigners citing documentary evidence. Three of these four individuals were included in the NRC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
New Delhi: Sixty-three Muslims in Assam are at high risk of deportation after the Indian Supreme Court directed the state government to begin the process of expelling them. According to Kashmir Media Service, families of those held in detention centers have strongly refuted claims that they are Bangladeshi foreigners, insisting on their Indian citizenship. The …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":169925,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-169924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hindutva"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/assests\/2025\/02\/download-8.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169924","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169924"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169924\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":169926,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169924\/revisions\/169926"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169925"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kmsnews.org\/kms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}