5 min readNov 15, 2004 12:00 AM IST
First published on: Nov 15, 2004 at 12:00 AM IST
The Government of India’s decision to retain the Illegal Migrants’ Determination by Tribunals Act is yet another instance of political considerations taking precedence over national security considerations. It is distressing how decisions at the highest level are taken more to appease a particular segment of population, sacrificing all norms of border management and closing our eyes to one of the greatest problems of internal security — illegal migrations from across the eastern borders.
The historical background of the Act needs to be understood. The All Assam Students’ Union and the All Assam Gana Sangram Parishad spearheaded an agitation from 1979 to 1985 in Assam against the large-scale influx of foreigners in the State. The Assamese were apprehensive that they would be overwhelmed by the sea of humanity from across the international borders. Rajiv Gandhi’s initiative led to the signing of the Assam Accord on August 15, 1985, whereby it was agreed that for purposes of detection of foreigners, January 1, 1966 shall be the base date and year, that those who came to Assam on or after that date and up to March 24, 1971 shall be detected and their names deleted from the electoral rolls, and that those who came on or after March 25 shall be detected and expelled. The non-implementation of vital clauses of the Accord is a sore point with the Assamese. The IMDT Act was enacted to detect and deport foreigners. It proved quite ineffective because the provisions are heavily tilted in favour of the illegal immigrants:
8226; Every application made against any person is to be accompanied by affidavits sworn by not less than two persons residing within the jurisdiction of the same police station;
8226; The application shall be accompanied by the prescribed fee;
8226; Onus of proof shall lie with complainant.
It took away the powers of issuing ‘Quit India’ notices, arrest, interrogation, etc. from the police and passed on the burden of proof, unlike in the Foreigners’ Act, to the police. An immigrant got so much time at various stages that he could disappear whenever action was going to be taken against him. Detection and deportation under the Act was extremely slow and cumbersome. The IMDT Act was branded a ‘Black Law’ by the Assamese because, as stated by D N Bezboruah, editor of Sentinel, it discriminated against Assam which has this law while all other states are governed by the Foreigners Act of 1946, made the detection and deportation of illegal immigrants ‘‘virtually impossible’’, placed the onus of proving nationality on the citizen who made the complaint and not on the migrant, encouraged illegal migrants of other states to move to Assam because it would be most difficult to deport them from here.
No civilised country has two immigration laws. The former AGP government of Assam went to the Supreme Court for abrogation of the Act. The Northeastern States also filed affidavits in the apex court in this context. The SC, on September 20, 1999, expressed concern over the unabated migration of Bangladeshis refugees to Northeastern States and asked the Centre to make ‘‘honest and serious’’ attempts to stop this influx. A Division Bench said that this influx of Bangladeshis was posing a ‘‘danger to the region’s demography.’’
The present Congress government of Assam however, in a complete volte face, filed an affidavit in the SC that the IMDT Act was adequate to detect and deport the illegal immigrants and that it did not protect the interests of Bangladeshis. The affidavit admitted that so far only 1,494 persons declared illegal migrants by the tribunals could be deported. This was hardly .03 of the total number of illegal Bangladeshi immigrants in Assam alone. The affidavit was a masterpiece of hypocrisy.
The Centre had appointed a task force on border management in the wake of the Kargil conflict. Headed by Madhav Godbole, former union home secretary, it made an emphatic recommendation that the IMDT Act should be repealed and action against immigrants taken uniformly under the Foreigners Act. The Group of Ministers endorsed the recommendation. The previous NDA government introduced a Bill in the Lok Sabha to repeal the IMDT Act. The Bill was sent to a committee headed by Pranab Mukherjee, but meanwhile the House was dissolved and the Bill lapsed. And now we have a decision which goes against the recommendation of the former Assam government, runs contrary to the pleadings of the Northeastern States, violates the specific recommendation of the task force on border management on this point, overrules the GoM endorsement, and turns a deaf ear to the SC’s concerns.
Insurgency, terrorism or separatism in the Northeast have a direct bearing on the massive infiltrations from Bangladesh. The former Governor of Assam, Lt Gen retd S K Sinha, had warned in 1998 that the Assamese ‘‘cultural survival will be in jeopardy, their political control will be weakened and their employment opportunities will be undermined’’ if the demographic invasion of Assam was not tackled properly.
But the present government, by retaining a toothless piece of legislation, is making the illegal immigrants feel comfortable in their new found homes in Assam. Must we continue to fiddle with national security while the Northeast is burning?
The writer is a former DGP of Assam
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