‘This has gone too far, this has become a joke’: SC to Assam government on deportation of illegal migrants

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The Supreme Court on Wednesday lambasted the Assam government, stressing that it was non-serious about the issue of deportation of illegal migrants.

“This has gone too far. This has become a joke,” said the apex court.

Questioning Solicitor General Tushar Mehta during the hearing, the court asked about the whereabouts of the foreigners, whether the foreigners tribunal was functioning and whether the law and order machinery of Assam government was taking measures to implement the order passed in this regard by the tribunal.

The court has asked the Assam government to file a detailed report on the functioning of Assam's foreigners tribunal by May 27. “How seriously Assam is considering this matter is quite evident from the absence of any officer to brief you in the matter. An officer sitting here (resident commissioner) files an affidavit on detention centres in Assam,” says the bench led by CJI

The SC also recalled an order passed on this issue in 2005 and said that Assam government must have studied that order passed in which the top court had said that Assam is facing the threat of external aggression. The apex court asked the Government of India and Assam that what steps have been taken by them to tackle this issue.

The SC minced no words in saying that it does not think that no steps had been taken to tackle this problem and ordered Assam government to inform the court about the number of persons declared foreigners by the tribunals, number of persons at the detention centres and number of persons sent back to the country of origin. 

Meanwhile, the Assam government informed the SC that the Assam's foreigners tribunal had declared over 50,000 migrants as foreigners in the past 10 years and around 900 migrants who had been declared foreigners were being kept in six detention centres.

The SC made the observations while hearing a plea filed by activist Harsh Mander through advocate Prashant Bhushan on the plight of foreigners in Assam's detention centres. In his plea, Mander has claimed that the foreigners were kept in detention indefinitely just because they were not Indians.