6 yıl önce

Thousands of alleged immigrants locked up in India's Assam

Alleged immigrants in Assam are pinning their hopes on a verification programme called the National Register of Citizens, which considers someone a legal citizen if they can prove a connection to the Indian state before the Bangladesh War in 1971.

Reuters

Villagers walk past Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel patrolling a road ahead of the publication of the first draft of the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in the Juria village of Nagaon district in the northeastern state of Assam, India, on December 28, 2017.

Authorities in the Indian state of Assam are detaining people accused of being illegal immigrants.

Unauthorised border crossings from Bangladesh have historically been a problem in India’s state of Assam. In 2009, the border police began a crackdown. Lawyers and activists say more than 13,000 people were designated foreigners within a year of the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party coming to power in Assam in 2016.

Sabbar Ali Shiekh is now used to waiting near the detention centre. It's where his mother, accused of being an illegal foreigner, has been held since last August. Born in India, Sabbar Ali says he doesn't understand why she's behind bars.

“We've paid 40,000 rupees to lawyers and submitted all the documents we have. But they've locked her up saying she's Bangladeshi," he says.

As Radhika Bajaj reports from Assam, activists are warning it's the poor and illiterate, as well as Muslims, who in many cases end up in detention centres.