New Delhi: A Gauhati high court lawyer has filed an urgent complaint with the National Human Rights Commission, noting that Indian citizens and declared foreigners who had been released earlier are being re-arrested and detained, and facing the threat of forced deportation.
Advocate A. Wadud Aman said in his complaint that the re-arrested and detained individuals had not violated any conditions of their release, but were still picked up by the Assam Police.
“Shockingly, these individuals are now being re-arrested and detained again as of 23.05.2025, without any fresh violation or breach to the Supreme Court’s conditions for release, and now are being forcibly deported — 14 such people have been pushed to No Man’s Land between India and Bangladesh — in complete disregard of the Constitution of India and international human rights norms,” Wadud says in his complaint.
The advocate has asked the NHRC to take suo motu cognisance of the “arbitrary re-arrest and detention”, seek a status report from the chief secretary of the Assam government and the Director General of Assam Police and intervene to prevent forced deportation. It also asks the commission to direct the state government to immediately release the re-arrested individuals, recommend the formulation of a humane and transparent policy for cases of disputed citizenship, as well as suggest compensation and rehabilitation for those who had already endured prolonged unlawful detention and were forced into it yet again.
The intervention has, as per the complaint, been sought “in the interest of justice, liberty, and constitutional dignity of those who have long suffered the indignity of statelessness, and are now being subjected to further inhuman treatment.”
The complaint notes that the detainees who had previously been released on the basis of Supreme Court orders from 2019 and 2020 had “complied scrupulously with the conditions of release, including periodic appearances before police stations, and resided with their family members and community in India.” The actions of the state, therefore it says, are violative of Articles 21 (right to life and liberty), 14 (right to equality before law and non arbitrariness in state action) and 22 (protection from arbitrary arrest) of the Indian constitution. It also points out that Section 483 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, stipulates that bail once granted cannot be set aside unless specific orders of violation are shown and fresh proceedings are initiated.
Finally, the complainant argues that forced deportation without exhausting all remedies under the Foreigners Act 1946 and the Citizenship Act, 1955, and without any hearing, amounts to refoulement, which is prohibited under customary international human rights law. This includes the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which India is party.
This story was originally published in thewire.in. Read the full story here.
