The first batch of 104 illegal Indian immigrants, in which the highest number is of 33 each from Haryana and Gujarat, reached Amritsar in Punjab on Wednesday in a US military aircraft. Altogether 30 deportees belonged to Punjab.
The US military C-17 aircraft landed at Sri Guru Ram Dass Jee International Airport amidst tight security. Three each from Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra while two from Chandigarh. The deportees include 25 women and 12 minors with the youngest passenger being just four years old.
Forty-eight people are below the age of 25. The flight took off from Texas on Tuesday carrying 11 crew members and 45 US officials overseeing the deportation process.
According to a senior Punjab official, most deportees from the state belong to Gurdaspur, Amritsar, Tarn Taran, Jalandhar, Nawanshahr, Patiala, Mohali and Sangrur.
Many of them had come into the country illegally, and some had also over-stayed their visas. The C-17 plane departed from San Antonio, Texas. It is the first deportation round of illegal immigrants, which happened when Prime Minister Narendra Modi visits Washington next week.
This would be PM Modi's first visit since Donald Trump assumed office for the second term as US President.
External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar had earlier maintained that New Delhi is open to the "legitimate return" of Indian nationals living illegally abroad, including the US.India has expressed willingness to accept them, postverification, EAM Jaishankar conveyed the same to the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio last month.
"For the first time in history, we are locating and loading illegal aliens into military aircraft and flying them back to the places from which they came," President Trump said while speaking to reporters last month.
Punjab NRI Affairs Minister Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal has termed the US decision to deport the Indians as "worrisome".
He said that such Indians had long been contributing to the US economy and should have been granted permanent residency, instead of being deported. As many as 7,25,000 illegal immigrants from India live in the US, which makes it the third-largest population of unauthorised immigrants after Mexico and El Salvador, according to data from the Pew Research Centre.
Many people from Punjab, who are now facing deportation, had entered the US through the "donkey route" or other illegal means by spending lakhs of rupees. The US administration has launched a crackdown against illegal immigrants after Trump became the President.
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