Clashes break out between Rohingya, police at ‘holding centre’ in J&K’s Hiranagar
Trouble erupted when the ‘holding centre’ staff who were opening the barracks were held captive by the Rohingya detainees. The police team that rushed to the spot was attacked with stones.
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The clashes broke out after the police went in to rescue the centre in-charge and two other staff members who were held captive by the detainees, senior police officials said. (Express Photo) Myanmar nationals lodged at the Holding Center in Jammu and Kashmir’s Hiranagar town for the last two years clashed with the police on Tuesday morning, resulting in injuries on both sides.
The clashes broke out after the police went in to rescue the centre in-charge and two other staff members who were held captive by the detainees, senior police officials said, adding that nearly half a dozen policemen were injured in stone pelting by the Rohingya.
The situation was brought under control by 11 am after police and Central Reserve Police Force reinforcements sent to the centre resorted to a lathi charge and lobbed teargas shells to control the unruly mob. The Holding Center employees were rescued from the detainees who had even occupied their office room, officials said.
About a dozen Rohingya were also injured in the clashes. A senior police officer said that many of them sustained injuries due to stones pelted by the protesters standing behind them. The injured were given first aid and no one sustained any major injuries, officials said.
The atmosphere inside the Holding Center in Kathua district has been tense since last May and detainees have been holding demonstrations and hunger strikes at frequent intervals. At present, a total of 271 Rohingya, including 74 women and 70 children (many have been born inside the centre), are lodged there.
Trouble erupted when the centre staff who were opening the barracks in the morning were held captive by the Rohingya who pressed for their release. As the news spread, a police party from Hiranagar police station rushed to the spot but they were attacked with stones.
Later, Kathua SSP Shiv Deep Singh Jamwal reached the centre along with other police and prison officials to take stock and said the situation was now under control.
The centre was a sub-jail before the J&K government notified it as a ‘holding centre’ on March 5, 2021, for lodging illegal Myanmar immigrants as defined under Section 2(b) of the Citizenship Act, 1955. A number of the detainees have been there since March 6, 2021, when both the Centre and the Jammu and Kashmir government had started moving the Rohingya, who were illegally staying in Jammu, to the Holding Center at Hiranagar so that they could be deported to Myanmar.
However, their deportation could not take place following an April 2021 Supreme Court order that said that those detained in Jammu should not be deported without following the due procedure as laid down by law.
The detainees have been demanding their immediate release so that they can rejoin their family members, including children, who have been staying at Rohingya settlements outside the centre.
The presence of Rohingya and Bangladeshi nationals has been a matter of unrest among various Jammu-based organisations, with a traders’ body even threatening to kill them unless they were deported.
In a public interest litigation filed by Hunar Gupta seeking the deportation of the Myanmar and Bangladeshi nationals staying in J&K, the Jammu and Kashmir High Court had in April 2022 granted six weeks to the government to identify immigrants from these two countries who have been illegally staying in the Union Territory.
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