New Delhi: With Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann taking exceptions to US flights carrying Indian deportees landing in Amritsar, government sources Wednesday defended the move, saying the state makes up for the biggest share of these illegal immigrants.
Sharing figures of the three flights that have arrived in India since February 5, they said Punjab residents total 126 of the 333 people deported in US military aircraft, followed by 110 from neighbouring Haryana and 74 from Gujarat.
Eight of them were from Uttar Pradesh, five from Maharashtra, two each from Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, Rajasthan and Goa, and one each from Jammu and Kashmir, and Uttarakhand. Each of the three flights on February 5, 15 and 16 carried over 100 Indians and 333 of them have been deported so far, they added. The total includes 262 men, 42 women and 29 minors, the sources added.
As many as 21 flights carrying Indian deportees have arrived in the country since May 2020 and all of them landed in Amritsar, they said. Since Donald Trump's inauguration as US President, whose campaign promises included a crackdown on illegal immigrants, three military aircraft have arrived in India carrying the deportees.
Opposition parties protested the treatment meted out to the deportees, including them being shackled, and asked the Indian government to take up the issue with the US. After the first flight landed on February 5, Mann accused the Centre of trying to defame Punjab and said a holy city like Amritsar should not be made a "deport centre". This flight had 30 deportees from Punjab and 33 each from Haryana and Gujarat.
He kept up his attack and said on Tuesday that if another US plane carrying deportees arrives in India, it may not land in the state following strong objections raised by him. The second flight had 65 deportees from Punjab, 33 from Haryana and eight from Gujarat. The corresponding numbers for the third flight were 31, 44 and 33.
Following the opposition's protest, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar told Parliament on February 6 that the government was engaging with the US to ensure that deported Indians are not mistreated. The minister, however, added that the process of deportation is not a new one, and the standard operating procedure for deportation by aircraft provides for the use of restraints. Women and children were not restrained, he added.
Government sources said the rules of the US' Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the agency tasked with such deportations, stipulate that the "detainees transported by ICE aircraft" will be fully restrained by the use of handcuffs, waist chains and leg irons".
