KOLKATA: Centre has moved Supreme Court challenging a Calcutta HC order on Sept 26 to repatriate Sunali Khatun and five others, who were pushed into Bangladesh on the grounds of being illegal immigrants , within four weeks.
Centre's petition, filed on Oct 22, comes amid reports the families of the six, who are from Bengal's Birbhum and were rounded up in New Delhi, are planning to plead with HC for an order to Indian authorities to implement the repatriation order. The four-week period during which Sunali, husband Danish Sheikh, their 8-year-old son Sabir, Sweety Bibi and her two minor sons were to be brought back home ended on Oct 24.
A habeas corpus petition filed by Sunali's father Bhodu Sheikh in HC in Aug mentioned that she was eight months pregnant. "Every entity has the prerogative to move a higher forum challenging an order. But considering the sensitivity of the case, involving a woman with an advanced stage of pregnancy and two sons of Sweety, it was expected that the matter would be sorted out at the earliest," said the lawyer who represented Sunali's family.
Sunali, Danish and Sweety worked as ragpickers in New Delhi's Rohini. They were picked up on June 21 on suspicion of being Bangladeshis. On June 24, the Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO) in New Delhi ordered they be kept in a community centre in Rohini. A deportation order was passed on June 26 and the six were pushed into Bangladesh the same day. They were arrested in Bangladesh on Aug 21 for illegally entering the country and have been in jail there since.
The division bench of Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty and Justice Reetobroto Kumar Mitra had on Sept 26 scrapped the FRRO order before ordering the return of the six within four weeks. The bench criticised the Centre's submission that the burden of proof under the Foreigners Act 1946 was on the detained people, saying the law did not "empower the executive to pick up a person at random, knock at his or her door, and tell him that he is a foreigner".
HC said Sunali's father was a permanent resident of Birbhum and the detainees had lived there for a long time since their birth.
Centre's petition, filed on Oct 22, comes amid reports the families of the six, who are from Bengal's Birbhum and were rounded up in New Delhi, are planning to plead with HC for an order to Indian authorities to implement the repatriation order. The four-week period during which Sunali, husband Danish Sheikh, their 8-year-old son Sabir, Sweety Bibi and her two minor sons were to be brought back home ended on Oct 24.
A habeas corpus petition filed by Sunali's father Bhodu Sheikh in HC in Aug mentioned that she was eight months pregnant. "Every entity has the prerogative to move a higher forum challenging an order. But considering the sensitivity of the case, involving a woman with an advanced stage of pregnancy and two sons of Sweety, it was expected that the matter would be sorted out at the earliest," said the lawyer who represented Sunali's family.
Sunali, Danish and Sweety worked as ragpickers in New Delhi's Rohini. They were picked up on June 21 on suspicion of being Bangladeshis. On June 24, the Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO) in New Delhi ordered they be kept in a community centre in Rohini. A deportation order was passed on June 26 and the six were pushed into Bangladesh the same day. They were arrested in Bangladesh on Aug 21 for illegally entering the country and have been in jail there since.
The division bench of Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty and Justice Reetobroto Kumar Mitra had on Sept 26 scrapped the FRRO order before ordering the return of the six within four weeks. The bench criticised the Centre's submission that the burden of proof under the Foreigners Act 1946 was on the detained people, saying the law did not "empower the executive to pick up a person at random, knock at his or her door, and tell him that he is a foreigner".
HC said Sunali's father was a permanent resident of Birbhum and the detainees had lived there for a long time since their birth.
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