Working to ensure deportees not mistreated, says EAM S Jaishankar

Opposition protests treatment meted out to Indians by US authorities

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar told Parliament on Thursday the government was engaging with the US administration “to ensure that the returning deportees are not mistreated in any manner during the flight”.

 

Jaishankar’s statement in Parliament came in the wake of persistent Opposition protests in Parliament at the handcuffing and shackling of the 104 undocumented Indians the US sent back in a military aircraft, which landed in Amritsar on Wednesday.

 

Both Houses were adjourned several times during the course of their proceedings.

 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to visit Washington next week.

 

In his statement in the two Houses, Jaishankar said 15,668 illegal Indian immigrants had been deported to India from the US between 2009 and 2024.

 

 

Jaishankar indicated the restraining procedures used by the US authorities, especially its Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), which organises and executes deportations, predate 2014.

 

Jaishankar told Parliament such “restraint procedure” had been the “standard operating procedure” for deportation by aircraft used by the ICE since 2012.

 

The minister said India’s “focus should be to crack down strongly on the illegal migration industry, while taking steps to ease visas for the legitimate traveller”.

 

He said law-enforcement agencies would take preventive action based on information provided by returning deportees. 

 

Jaishankar said the government had been informed by the ICE “that women and children are not restrained. And the needs of deportees during transit related to food or other necessities, including possible medical emergencies (were taken care of)”.

 

“During toilet breaks, deportees are temporarily unrestrained if needed in that regard. This is applicable to chartered civilian aircraft as well as the military aircraft. There has been no change from past procedure, I repeat, no change, from past procedure for the flight undertaken by the US on February 5, 2025,” he said.

 

Jaishankar said the numbers for 2009-14 from the US Department of Homeland Security were much higher.

 

According to a PTI report from Uttar Pradesh, Rakshit Baliyan (19) of Muzzffarnagar district and Gurpreet Singh (24) from Pilibhit district were among the 104 Indians deported from the US.

 

Baliyan’s father, Sudhir Baliyan, a retired Army trooper, told PTI that his son had gone to the US seven months ago and was working in a private company. Sudhir Baliyan, who owns 20 bighas of agricultural land, said his son would continue his education.

 

Kulbir Singh, father of Devindra Singh, the other deportee from Muzaffarnagar, said his son had left for the US two months ago. He was caught shortly after arriving in the US and remained in custody at a detention camp until his deportation.

 

Kulbir Singh, a small farmer with 15 bighas of agricultural land, paid Rs 40 lakh to agents to send his son abroad.