For 68-year old Johrabai Shaikh, history has repeated itself, and how. As she stood at the Esplanade Magistrate court on Tuesday, defending her 27-year-old grandson, Nabi Shaikh who was taken into custody for illegally entering the country, she must have been reminded of her seven days in custody in 1994 when she was held on the same charge.

The Free Press Journal reported that arguing against Nabi’s remand, his advocate Mohammed Hussain told the court that in 1994 the youth’s grandmother had been acquitted on a similar charge after the court had found her to be an Indian citizen. However, posing no query about Johrabai’s case, the court remanded Nabi to custody till Thursday.

Adiya Shaikh, Nabi’s sister had explained that Nabi worked at the docks where he did insulation work and had gone there to help his uncle to sell fish at Antop Hill from where he was arrested. The same spot from where Johrabai was arrested 26 years ago while the family lived there.

18 years ago, on December 2, 2002, standing in the same building as Nabi, Johrabai, then 50, had received her acquittal of being an illegal Bangladeshi immigrant by metropolitan magistrate SS Shirke after the court had said that the documents tendered by her proved that she had been residing in Mumbai for years, a fact that dispelled doubts about her nationality.

Speaking about Johrabai Shaikh, Magistrate Shirke had said, “She produced an identity card issued to her by the Election Commission which allows her to take part in the election to the house of people and the legislative assembly, which she cannot possibly do unless she is a citizen of India. She has also produced a new passport issued to her by the Government of India. After expiry, a new passport was issued to her…the passport cannot be issued unless the applicant is a citizen of India. These two documents prima facie indicate that she is not a foreigner in India.”

The court had also observed how she had produced both her old and new ration cards, a domicile certificate and the birth certificate of her daughter and observed, “The police cannot act arbitrarily but need to conduct a discreet inquiry before prosecuting a person alleged to be a Bangladeshi.”

On Tuesday, Johrabai asked the court that if it was convinced that she was Indian, how could they pronounce her son to be a Bangladeshi? When she was asked about how long she had been in India, she said, “Meri aankhen hi idhar khuli. Wo humein Bengali hai bol ke, Bangadeshi bolte hain.” (My eyes opened here. Because we are Bengali they think we are Bangladeshis).”

Post the announcement of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC), there has been a lot of confusion about the documents that are necessary to prove citizenship.

On February 12, 2020 a division bench of the Gauhati High Court said that the electoral photo identity card isn’t a proof of citizenship. On the same day, another bench observed that PAN card, bank documents, land tax receipts etc were not sufficient proof of citizenship.

However, on February 11, a trial court in Mumbai acquitted two persons under the Foreigners Act, 1946 by ruling that the electoral id card was sufficient proof of citizenship.

However, the government has still not taken a stand on which documents will be accepted as the official proof of citizenship.

In a press release it had said, “Citizenship can be proved by submitting any documents related to date of birth and place of birth. However, a decision is yet to be taken on such acceptable documents. This is likely to include voter cards, passports, Aadhaar, licenses, insurance papers, birth certificates, school leaving certificates, documents relating to land or home or other similar documents issued by government officials. This is likely to include more documents so that no other Indian has to suffer unnecessarily.”

However, with the debate around citizenship intensifying, the government has begun its crackdown on supposed illegal immigrants. There are hundreds like Nabi Shaikh who will potentially be bereft of a home in the country. Be it Karnataka or Maharashtra, the government and its allies are arbitrarily singling out people on the pretext of them being illegal immigrants without any proof.

While this is truly a citizenship issue where the minorities and the marginalized are set to be the worst-hit, the discussion has turned into a violent and communal one pitting one community against the other.

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On Saturday, a group of close to 50 members of the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) barged into Gulmohar Appartments, located in the Balaji Nagar area of Dhankavali and accused three Bengali Muslim men of being Bangladeshi. The men were led by Rahul Gawli and accompanied by the police.

MNS member Sachin Katkar told Indian Express, “Raj Thackeray saheb had given us an aadesh (order) to remove Pakistani and Bangladeshi Muslims staying in Maharashtra illegally. As per this directive, we gathered early morning in presence of the police at the thickly crowded Balajinagar area, where many illegal immigrants stay. After conducting the raid, we handed over the illegal Bangladeshis to the police. Although they showed some ID documents, they were clearly fake.”

On February 9, 2020, at a mega rally in support of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), MNS chief Raj Thackeray, in a purported attempt to hold on to last vestiges of political relevance by way of getting into the regime’s good books had said that illegal immigrants should be “thrown out”. In a chilling warning to the Muslim community, Thackeray had said, “Henceforth, it will be a stone for a stone and a sword for a sword.” He had also said that if the administration was unable to weed out the Bagladeshis, his party men would do the job.

Meanwhile, the three Pune men were identified as Dilshad Mansuri, Roshan Shaikh and Bappi Sardar, all hailing from West Bengal. Dilshad operates a food stall, Bappi is an electrician and Shaikh polishes gold and silver jewellery. They were forced to produce evidence of Indian citizenship. The men were taken to the Sahakar Nagar police station where Shaikh was made to call his mother in Hoogly and she in turn was made to rush to the nearest police station to get them to confirm that he was indeed her Indian born son. After their credentials checked out, the police were forced to let them go.

Shaikh has now filed a complaint against the MNS men accusing them of harassment, trespassing and invasion of privacy. He narrated his ordeal saying, “At the police station, the cops took details of my mother in Hooghly and called her. Although she confirmed that I belong to Hooghly, the police officer asked her to go to the nearest police station and request the local cops to re-confirm that I was her son born in India. My mother had to rush to the Pandua police station and request the policeman to speak to cops in Pune. Even after this condition was met, they made me wait at the police station until 6 pm, while my wife and kids anxiously waited for me.”

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Recently, much awaited migration data has been released by Office of the Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India. While demographers are presumably busy analysing the data, certain preliminary observations are noteworthy, especially in the context of Assam where strong allegation of large-scale illegal migration from Bangladesh has assumed greater significance post NRC.

While data on foreign migrants do not distinguish between a legal migrant and an illegal migrant, but such data is important indicator of the volume and pattern of overall international migration in India and more specifically in the state of Assam.

Census of India releases two types of migration data – Migration by Birth place and Migration by place of last residence. When a person is enumerated in Census at a place which is different from her/his place of birth, she/he would be considered a migrant by place of birth. On the other hand, a person would be considered a migrant by place of last residence, if she/he had last resided at a place other than her/his place of enumeration. Migrant by place of last residence is generally considered to be a better way to understand international migration.

Influx from Bangladesh and Pakistan

Referring to the Census data on foreign migrants on the basis of their last place of residence outside India and duration of stay in India, one may at first observe that the total international migrants has increased by 7%, from 51.55 lakhs in 2001 to 54.91 lakhs in 2011. However, there is surprising change in the source country wise data for foreign migrants. If we compare foreign migrants who arrived in India during the two succeeding decades (1991-2001 and 2001-2011) then we find number of Bangladeshi migrants’ flow to India has declined from 2.79 lakhs during 1991-2001 to 1.72 lakhs during 2001-2011. Which means there is 50% decline in migrants’ flow to India from Bangladesh between the last two decades.

Accordingly, there is sharp decline (25%) in the total number of Bangladeshi migrants in India, from 30.84 lakhs in 2001 to 23.04 lakhs in 2011. The proportion of Bangladeshi migrants in 2001 was about 60% of total international migrants in India, which has sharply reduced to 42% in 2011.

Similarly, number of Pakistani migrants has also declined from 9.97 lakhs in 2001 to 7.07 lakhs, that is a decline of about 29%. Pakistani migrants are second largest international migrants after Bangladeshi migrants.

Influx from Nepal

While flow of migrants has considerably reduced from Bangladesh and Pakistan, there is huge increase (30%) of migrants from neighbouring country Nepal. Number of migrants from Nepal has made a quantum jump from 5.96 lakhs in 2001 to 7.78 lakhs in 2011. Nepal still hold its 3rd position in terms of number of international migrants in India.

African and American migrants

However, the biggest surprise is that India seems to have become a preferred destination of American and African migrants. Number of American migrants in India has increased from a meagre 0.26 lakhs in 2001 to 4.00 lakhs in 2011 that is an increase by 1452%. Similarly, African migrants has also increased by a whopping 491%, from 0.64 lakhs in 2001 to 3.81 lakhs in 2011. As a result, combined proportion of American and African migrants, in overall foreign migrants’ population in India, has increased seven folds, from 2% in 2001 to 14% in 2011.

The case of Assam

In Assam, amidst widespread allegation of large-scale migration from Bangladesh, the census data on foreign migrants assumes special significance. The 2011 census data on foreign migrants reflects that out of 54.91 lakh foreign migrants in India, only 1.10 lakh foreign migrants are being censused in Assam, the largest number of foreign migrants being enumerated in West Bengal (20.05 lakhs) followed by Bihar (3.98 lakhs), Uttar Pradesh (3.55 lakhs) and Maharashtra (3.24 lakhs). In fact, as per 2011 Census reports, there are 12 states in India where number of foreign migrants is higher than Assam.

Again, out of the total 11.12 lakh foreign migrants who arrived in India during the decade 2001-2011, the major destination is West Bengal (1.83 lakhs). Only 0.11 lac foreign migrants came to Assam during the same decade (2001-2011). Also, there are 17 states, other than West Bengal, which saw arrival of higher number of foreign migrants than Assam during the decade 2001-2011 like Maharashtra (1.83 lakhs), Bihar (1.20 lakhs), Kerala (1.03 lakhs) etc.

In the context of Assam, again, the biggest concern is about Bangladeshi migrants who came to Assam during the decade 2001-2011. The Census data of 2011 reveals that out of a total of 1.72 lakh Bangladeshi migrants who arrived in India during 2001-2011, only 1,916 migrants from Bangladesh were enumerated in Assam. The major destination for Bangladeshi migrants still continued to be West Bengal. About 1.51 lakh Bangladeshi migrants, which constitutes 88% of the total migrants from Bangladesh, arrived in West Bengal during 2001-2011. It is worthwhile to mention here that successive census since 1971 shows that the number of Bangladeshi migrants who arrived in Assam during 1971-2001 is only 31,151. Another interesting revelation from the 2011 census data is that American migrants (2,618) who came to Assam during the decade 2001-2011 is about 37% higher than the Bangladeshi migrants who arrived in this state during the same period. Bangladeshi migrants constitute only 16.6% of the total international migrants (11,508) who came to Assam during the period 2001-2011.

If Census data is to be believed, then there is no indication of large scale migration in Assam, illegal or otherwise, from foreign countries, especially from Bangladesh, after 1971, and more particularly during the last census decade (2001-2011). Question is how long the allegation of large-scale migration from Bangladesh will continue in Assam.

On the other hand, there are stronger reasons to justify and believe that demographic change in Assam is predominantly due to very high socio-economic inequalities in areas of female literacy, fertility behavior of women (TFR), multi-dimensional poverty, adolescent marriage, spatial distribution of population (rural-urban). Unless such inequalities are addressed, through socio-economic development, the unequal population growth pattern and, therefore, the demographic change would continue unabated.

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The Hindu reported that, the government has publicly declared the number of Bangladeshi nationals who were detained in Bangladesh in the year 2019. The Border Guards Bangladesh (BGB) said that the government has initiated legal proceedings against the 999 Bangladeshi who lived illegally in India and were deported back. This announcement was made after talks between BGB and India’s Border Security Force towards the end of December.

At a press conference, Director General of BGB, Major General Shafeenul Islam declared that among the 999 people detained, were 135 children, 258 women and 606 men. Officials said they were arrested on the border, while going to India or returning home. Bangladesh has also reassured India through its foreign police advisor that it would take back its people if they were illegally staying in India, provided it is proved that they are Bangladeshi citizens.

This accounts for another step taken by Bangladesh government towards keeping relations with India friendly. Recently when the Bangladesh Foreign Minister’s cancellation of visit to India was seen as a move condemning the passing of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the Bangladesh government had clarified that the friendly relations still exist and the visit was cancelled due to internal administrative reasons. The Citizenship Amendment Act seeks to grant easy citizenship to non-Muslim refugees from Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan as they are “religiously persecuted” in these countries. This allegation of persecution was known to have not gone down well with Bangladesh.

Simultaneously, India has also received a list of 96 Indians illegally staying in Bangladesh, 62 of which were handed over to BSF and rest were detained. Major General Islam also said that 35 Bangladeshi have been killed in border firing.

The Ministry of Home Affairs submitted to the Parliament in the recently concluded winter sessions that 1,154 Bangladeshis have been apprehended and deported to Bangladesh in the year 2019.

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The hunt for “Bangladeshi nationals” has now begun in Maharashtra. Karnataka already sent 59 undocumented immigrants to West Bengal to be deported by Border Security Force to Bangladesh. Reports also came in from cities like Agra, Delhi, Mathura that illegal immigrants have been booked.

On December 17 it was reported that the Anti-Terrorist Cell (ATC) of Boisar in Palghar district arrested 12 Bangladeshi nationals, which includes 9 women, on a tip-off received by them. The ATC officials said that those arrested did not have any valid documents to prove their nationality.

One of the officials told Sabrang India that they acted upon information received and they found out that these people did not have any documents. When asked if they have a list of documents that can be considered as valid, he brushed off ID documents like Aadhaar Card and PAN card and said that these documents don’t prove anything. He further said that sometimes people make passport also on fake documents so we do not consider having passport as an absolute proof. He further said that documents like domicile of father or mother is a stronger proof.

When asked if such operations of nabbing illegal immigrants have bolstered due to the new Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) he responded that such operations are a regular exercise and acted upon whenever information is received and they have been making such arrests since many years now and it has nothing to do with CAA.

When questioned about how did the police determine that they were Bangladeshi nationals and not just some poor migrants from West Bengal without documents he said, “Their phones had contacts saved which were numbers of Bangladeshi people. They are their relatives they are constantly in touch with.” He indicated that the arrested people all spoke Bangla and belonged to the Muslim Community. But, then can’t Bengali Muslim’s be Indian? Also is it that uncommon or even illegal to have relatives across the border?

Related:

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59 ‘illegal immigrants’ from Bengaluru to be deported
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Image Courtesy: thefederal.com

The Karnataka police have picked up at least 60 persons, including nine children on the charge of being undocumented Bangladeshi immigrants during a raid in three shanties across the city, The Deccan Herald reported.

The detainees, 29 men, 22 woman and the nine girls were rounded up from Marathahalli, Bellandur and Ramamurthy Nagar areas of the city on Saturday on October 26.

The move has come after the Indian government announced to extend its plans to implement the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Karnataka after it being implemented in Assam on August 31, 2019.

Just like the six detention centers to house illegal immigrants in Assam have been created, the government has already begun constructing a detention center in Sondekoppa in Nelamangala, around 40 km from Bengaluru.

Home Minister BasavarajBommai told the Deccan Herald that he had already ordered poloce to start collecting data on those living in the state illegally, without documents or fake documents.

A police team from the Central Crime Branch (CCB) has been collecting information about the illegal immigrants in the city following instructions from the Intelligence Bureau (IB) officials, who have been camping in the city ever since the talk of NRC began.

The people detained in this exercise are mostly daily wage workers earning their living as construction labourers, garbage collectors and doing menial jobs under contractors. Some of them are also employed by the contractors of the Bruhat Bengaluru MahanagaraPalike (BBMP).

“All the arrested will be deported to Bangladesh. There is information about some foreign nationals who are overstaying in KR Puram, Bagalur and other areas. Efforts are being made to arrest them. The passport and visa documents of all foreigners staying in the city are being checked,” Bangalore Mirror quoted one official as saying.

Speaking to The Federal, BhaskarRao, Police Commissioner said that the detainees would be handed over to the Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO) who will conduct a screening and hand them over to the Border Security Force (BSF). He also said that no case had been registered against the detainees under the Foreigner Act as he did not want to delay their exit from the country.

He said he wanted to follow a similar procedure to what the Delhi Police had followed when it detained and deported almost 500 Bangladeshis out of the country.

The raid conducted by officials of the Central Crime Branch came about by the inputs from the Intelligence Bureau. Though the detainees did produce valid nationality documents like the Aadhaar Card, Voter ID card, etc. the police dismissed them citing them to be ‘fake’. According to reports, the police identified the people to be illegal due to their ‘Bengali dialects’ which were different from the ones spoken in West Bengal.

On October 23, on the behest of a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by city advocate KB Vijayakumar seeking to identify and deport illegal Bangladesh immigrants, the Karnataka High Court directed both the state and central governments to file their response in the matter.

The implementation of the NRC in Assam has left behind 19 lakh ‘stateless citizens’. During this process, the country has witnessed around more than 35 deaths, suicides and some due to ill health induced by deplorable detention camp conditions.

There has been recorded proof of officials declaring Indian nationals as doubtful voters (d voters) or foreigners even with all of their documents being in place. While this citizenship and humanitarian crisis unleashed on Assam has shown us the futility of the exercise – what will the fate of Karnataka in the hands of a right-wing reveal?

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