Anup Chetia to be handed over to India

A senior Home Ministry official said that Chetia’s repatriation process began “several months ago and it is yet to be completed”.

The two countries do not have an extradition treaty and the existing agreement for exchanging imprisoned nationals in each other’s jails requires the consent of those jailed for repatriation to serve the rest of their terms in their own countries,he said. “Chetia’s repatriation required exhaustion of some legal procedures despite the end of his jail term” for illegal intrusion,the official added.

Chetia was arrested in Bangladesh in 1997 and is under detention on completion of his seven-year jail term for cross-border intrusion,carrying fake passports as well as illegal possession of foreign currency.

Asked about the Bangladesh government’s decision on Chetia,an Indian High Commission spokesperson here said that New Delhi had consistently requested Dhaka for his repatriation “in the absence of an extradition treaty”. “We expect him to be repatriated soon” as there was precedence of exchange of wanted persons between Bangladesh and India,he said.

Meanwhile,The Daily Star and several other newspapers,referring to unidentified “government sources”,said a process was underway to sign an extradition treaty under which Chetia could be repatriated while Bangladesh would also seek return of several of its wanted nationals either hiding or imprisoned in various jails in India.

Former Bangladesh Home Minister Sahara Khatun had said last year that she did not think “there is any obstacle in handing him (Chetia) over to India,but definitely there are procedures in extraditing someone who is in jail”.

“Chetia has expired his term in jail in Bangladesh … still he is in jail” in line with a high court directive in August 2003 to keep him in custody until the government took a decision on his plea seeking political asylum in Bangladesh,Khatun had said last year.