SC seeks reply from Centre, Assam on release of foreigners in detention Centres

The Supreme Court Tuesday sought response from the Centre and the Assam government on a plea seeking release of persons kept in overcrowded detention Centres, after being declared as foreigners, in view of coronavirus pandemic.

A bench of Chief Justice S A Bobde and Justice L Nageswara Rao issued notice and sought response from Assam and the Centre by April 13 on the plea of the woman whose husband has been declared as a foreigner and is lodged in detention centre for around two years, awaiting deportation.

Advocate Mohit Chaudhary, appearing for petitioner Rajubala Das, said the man cannot be deported as the government has no proof that he is a citizen of another country due to which his present category is of a stateless person, who would have to languish indefinitely unless released.

He said the extreme urgency in the matter is that the lives of such detenues is at risk in light of coronavirus or COVID-19 due to densely populated detention camps.

Chaudhary said that on May 10 last year, the top court had ordered that illegal foreigners in Assam who have completed more than three years in detention may be released after they provide biometric details in a secured database.

The bench said it would take up the matter next Monday.

The plea filed by Das also sought direction to the Assam government not to detain any person declared as foreigner by the foreigners tribunals until it can show proof of possible deportation in the foreseeable future.

It said as per the information provided by Minister of State for Home in Rajya Sabha on March 11, there are 802 persons living in the detention centres of Assam and most of those detained are those against whom an order has been passed by the Foreigners Tribunal holding them to be foreigners.

The petitioner's husband is a declared foreigner against whom an ex-parte order was passed. His children too were declared foreigners in the same case even though there had not been any reference made against them.

"The petitioner's husband had initially appeared in the Foreigners Tribunal but thereafter remained unrepresented due to financial inability, it said.

There are many others who have contested their case but are still held to be foreigners, the plea sid, adding that they cannot possibly be deported because the Centre has no proof to show they are citizens of any other country and thereby no foreign country will be willing to accept these people.

Detention of such persons indefinitely where there is no possibility of their deportation amounts to arbitrary detention and is thereby a violation of the personal liberty of the detained persons guaranteed as a fundamental right to all persons in the territory of India by Article 21 of the Constitution of India, it said.