By Maktoob Staff
Police in western Assam’s Barpeta district sent 28 Muslims declared “non-citizens” by the Foreigners’ Tribunals (FTs) to a ‘transit camp’ at Matia in the Goalpara district on Monday.
All the 28 people — 19 men and nine women — belong to the Bengali Muslim community.
They were summoned from various parts of the district to the office of Barpeta’s Superintendent of Police (SP) before being herded into a bus and sent to the detention centre.
A video shared on social media platforms and verified by Maktoob showed family members of the FT-declared “foreigners” gathered outside the SP’s office, crying and hugging each other as some members of the same family were declared ‘foreigners’ while others were not.
Transit camp is the official term for the 3,000-capacity detention centre for FT-declared “foreigners” to be deported.
Established under the Foreigners’ (Tribunal) Order of 1964, the FTs are quasi-judicial bodies headed by members to adjudicate cases of individuals suspected to be “foreigners.” Such people are detected by the Border wing of the Assam police, whose primary job is to detect suspected “foreigners” and refer them to the FTs. Assam has 100 FTs to deal with the cases of “D (doubtful) voters” and “foreigners” living in the state “illegally.”
This story was originally published in maktoobmedia.com. Read the full story here.