"Waiting For Muhurat?" Supreme Court Asks Assam To Deport 63 People

Coming down heavily on the Assam government for not deporting people declared as foreigners, the Supreme Court today asked if it was waiting for some "muhurat" (auspicious time). The bench of Justice Abhay S Oka and Justice Ujjal Bhuyan asked the Assam government to deport 63 people currently in the detention centres after they were declared foreigners during the exercise to update a National Register of Citizens (NRC) in the border state. The state argued that it did not know to address of the foreigners in their country of origin, but the court was not convinced.

Pulling up the state government, Justice Oka said Assam was suppressing facts. To this, Solicitor General of India Tushar Mehta replied that he had spoken to the highest authority of the Executive and apologised for "some lacunae".

Justice Oka said, "We will issue a perjury notice to you. You are supposed to come clean," he said. The state's counsel replied, "there is no intention to hide". Justice Oka said, "Of course, there is. Why have you not given the dates on which verification took place? The affidavit is defective."

Justice Bhuyan weighed in. "Once you declare a person as a foreigner, you must take the next logical step. You can't detain them forever. Article 21 is there. There are many foreigner detention centres in Assam. How many have you deported?"

Trashing the state's response that the addresses of foreigners in their countries were not known, Justice Oka said, "You deport them to the capital city of the country. Suppose the person is from Pakistan, you know the capital city of Pakistan? How can you keep them detained here saying their foreign address is not known?"

The bench said foreigners must be deported at once. "You know the status of their citizenship. Then how can you wait till their address is received? It is for the other country to decide where should they go." Justice Oka asked Assam why it had not submitted a proposal to the Ministry of External Affairs, seeking help.