Two flights carrying 119 Indians who identified as illegal migrants deported from the US are expected to arrive at the Guru Ram Dass International Airport in Amritsar on February 15 and February 16. Both flights are planning to land at 10.05 pm on February 15 and February 16, officials said.
Most of the deportees on the flights are from Punjab (67). They are followed by people from other states, comprising Haryana (33), Gujarat (8), Uttar Pradesh (3), Maharashtra (2), Goa (2), Rajasthan (2), and one each from Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir.
The deportees arranged to reach India include people who had penetrated the US through Mexico and other illegal ways. They also allegedly smashed their passports right away after arriving in the US unlawfully, officials stated.
The flights landing in Amritsar will make the second round of deportees reverting amid the historic crackdown on people infiltrating the US unlawfully by the Donald Trump administration.
Earlier, a US military aircraft that deported 104 illegal Indian immigrants from several states had landed in Punjab’s Amritsar on February 5.
Some deportees claimed that their hands were cuffed and legs were chained during the entire journey, and they were unchained only after landing in Amritsar.
This sparked nationwide resentment, with the opposition urging Prime Minister Narendra Modi to raise the matter with the US during his visit to Washington.
Senior Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge had alleged that the deportees were ill-treated “even worse than garbage.”
After a nationwide uproar, the government had expressed its concerns to the US administration about the treatment of deportees.
The deportations and the agonising experiences of Indian deportees had also led the police in Punjab and Haryana to start an operation against fraudulent travel agents who take huge chunks of money and assisted the illegal migration of Indians to the US.
