Calcutta High Court on Friday directed the Centre to bring back all six members of two Birbhum families, including eight-month pregnant Sunali Khatun aka Sonali, from Bangladesh within four weeks.
All the six persons, including three minors, had been pushed back to Bangladesh in June after being labelled nationals of the neighbouring country.
A division bench of Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty and Justice Reetobroto Kumar Mitra on Friday also set aside the central government’s order to deport Sunali, along with her husband and minor son. The court issued the same directive for Sweety Biwi
and her two minor children, who had been deported to Bangladesh along with Sunali after being detained in Delhi on suspicion of being Bangladeshi nationals.
“The deported persons must be brought back to the country within four weeks of communication of the court order,” said Justice Chakraborty, senior judge of the division bench.
The court asked the central government to make necessary correspondence with the High Commission of India in Dhaka, Bangladesh, to ensure their return.
The court criticised the central government’s claim that Sunali had entered India illegally in 1998. “Sunali’s Aadhaar card and PAN card reflect her date of birth as 26 years, indicating she was born in the year 2000. Hence, she could not have entered India in 1998,” the order stated.
Additional solicitor-general of eastern India, Ashok Chakrabarty, prayed before the bench to stay the operation of the day’s order for at least two weeks, which the court rejected.
Raghunath Chakrabarty, counsel for the petitioner, told the court: “Voter ID, land deeds and other documents clearly prove that my client and her family members are bona fide citizens of India. But they were forcefully pushed into Bangladesh.”
Speaking to reporters on Friday, the lawyer said: “Justice always prevails. We are happy with the court verdict.”
Budhu Sheikh alleged that his daughter Sunali, son-in-law Danish Sheikh and their minor son had been detained by Delhi police and deported.
The other petitioner, Aamir Khan, alleged that his daughter Sweety Biwi and two minor grandsons had suffered a similar fate.
The illegal detention and deportation of migrant workers from various districts has become a political issue in Bengal, with the Trinamool Congress strongly taking it up to push its narrative of the BJP being “anti-Bengali.” The BJP, however, has stuck to its claim that most of those deported to Bangladesh are Bangladeshi nationals.
A source said the central government deputed senior lawyers in both cases and, during the lengthy hearings, tried desperately to prove that those deported were not Indians.
Trinamool has projected the court’s Friday order as a major victory.
Samirul Islam, a Trinamool Rajya Sabha member and chairperson of the state migrant workers’ welfare board, has stood by the deported families since Day One.
“It was a victory for Bengal and a victory against those anti-Bengalis who deported poor Bengali-speaking Indian citizens only because they spoke Bengali. Today’s court order proved how those poor people, including a pregnant woman, were facing the wrath of the government’s anti-Bengali policy and spending nights in uncertainty abroad,” said Islam.
Trinamool’s national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee also criticised the BJP after the court ordered the Centre to bring back the families within four weeks.
“The court has ordered their repatriation within four weeks. They (the BJP) are arresting and detaining people just for speaking Bengali. On Vidyasagar’s birth anniversary, along with the slap that the high court delivered today, they must also apologise,” said Abhishek.
The BJP, however, argued that the incident involving Sunali and five others might have been a mistake and an isolated case, but it couldn’t justify allowing infiltrators from Bangladesh and Rohingya Muslims to stay in India.
“The incident was an awful mistake. This is an isolated case. But lakhs of Bangladeshi infiltrators cannot be allowed to stay in our country using this instance as a shield. The case of Sunali Khatun was collateral damage, and the government must be more careful before deportation,” said BJP spokesperson Debjit Sarkar.