Assam government has disclosed in the State Assembly for the first time officially the number of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh who have been repatriated in Assam under the Immigrants (Expulsion from Assam) Act, 1950.
The Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma told the House on Monday that 1,679 illegal immigrants were repatriated to Bangladesh, at the Question Hour during the ongoing Budget session of the Assam Legislative Assembly, which began in the morning, from July 1, 2024 through June 30, 2026. These numbers are the first official accounts of the state government’s “pushback” policy in terms of what it has done.
The Chief Minister said 193 individuals who had been declared foreigners by Assam's Foreigners Tribunals (FTs) were among those who were sent back to Bangladesh during the period. 67 declared foreigners had been pushed back across the international border in the last year alone.
The issue has drawn a lot of attention because Bangladesh has vehemently opposed India’s “pushback” mechanism and has said such actions should be done in line with diplomatic and legal procedures. Despite the criticism, the Assam government has maintained that the repatriation process is being carried out within the legal framework provided by the Immigrants (Expulsion from Assam) Act, 1950, which has been actively exercised by the state government over the past two years.
Chief Minister Sarma shared the data when confronted with a question by AIUDF MLA Badruddin Ajmal. He did not give a district-wise or month-wise breakup of the repatriations and didn't provide any details as to how deportations were done or how it happened.
The Chief Minister added that the state government did everything possible to ensure the human rights of those being repatriated were protected. He said individuals whose citizenship cases or appeals are still pending before courts have not been deported.
Sarma said: “The government has ensured that due legal procedures are followed, and those with pending legal proceedings have not been repatriated.”
Apart from the repatriation figures, the Assam government also released updated data on 'D-Voters', or voters whose citizenship status remains doubtful.
In a separate question raised by Congress MLA Nurul Islam, the Chief Minister mentioned that 91,385 D-Voters are presently in Assam's electoral rolls.
Among the districts, Sonitpur had the highest number of D-Voters at 13,719 and Barpeta had 8,081 such voters.
Sarma also told the House that 56,728 D-Voters have already been declared foreigners by the state’s Foreigners Tribunals. 831 individuals whose cases were appealed to higher courts were also declared illegal foreigners.
For decades, illegal immigration has been one of Assam’s most politically sensitive issues. Questions of border security, citizenship verification, and demographic changes have been going on in the state for years, hence the National Register of Citizens (NRC), Foreigners Tribunals, and the D-Voter mechanism, for example.
The latest disclosure comes at a time when India and Bangladesh continue to engage diplomatically on border management and migration issues. Even though the Assam government has defended its actions as being in line with existing laws, the "pushback" policy has been criticized by neighbouring Bangladesh as well as human rights groups.
Now that the facts are on record in the Assembly, the data will give much-needed momentum to the political as well as legal discussion about illegal immigration, citizenship verification, and border management in Assam.
