New Delhi: The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has filed a charge sheet in the NIA Special Court in Guwahati against six persons in the case of human trafficking of Rohingyas and Bangladeshi Muslims into India.
The charge sheet was filed against Kumkum Ahmed Choudhury alias K.K. Ahmed Chaudhury, Ahiya Ahmed Choudhury, Bapan Ahmed Choudhury, Sahalam Laskar, Jamaluddin Choudhury and Wanbiang Suting, under sections 120B, 370(3) and 370(5) of IPC.
The case pertains to the trafficking of Rohingyas and Bangladeshis into India for the purpose of exploitation and in order to settle them in India permanently on the basis of fake Indian documents.
The case was registered suo-moto by the NIA on December 27, 2021.
"Investigation has revealed that the accused persons were involved in organised human trafficking of Rohingyas and Bangladeshi, minor girls, women and others in association with other conspirators based in different parts of India and Bangladesh. The accused persons had arranged for transportation, accommodation, procurement of fake documents, etc., for the trafficked Rohingyas," the NIA said in the charge sheet.
Further investigation in the matter is on.
In recent years, Rohingya people have been increasingly seeking refuge in India, facing longstanding state-persecution in Myanmar.
In August 2017, the Bharatiya Janata Party led Union Government asked state governments to initiate the process of deportation for all illegal immigrants including Rohingyas. The government did not buckle despite criticism.
This was challenged before the Supreme Court of India by three Rohingya refugees, wherein the Government of India submitted an affidavit claiming that there were over 40,000 "illegal [Rohingya] immigrants", mostly spread across Assam, West Bengal and Jammu and Kashmir and that they were a threat to the security of state.
According to the 2001 census, 3,084,826 people in India came from Bangladesh. No reliable numbers on illegal immigrants are currently available. Extrapolating the census data for the state of Assam alone gives a figure of 2 million.
Figures as high as 20 million are also reported in the government and media. Samir Guha Roy of the Indian Statistical Institute called these estimates "motivated exaggerated".
After examining the population growth and demographic statistics, Roy states that while a vast majority are illegal immigrants, significant amounts of internal migration is sometimes falsely thought to be immigrants. A
n analysis of the numbers by Roy revealed that on average around 91000 Bangladeshis illegally crossed over to India every year during the years 1981–1991.
(with inputs from IANS)
