Amnesty Shows ‘Disturbing’ Stories of Assam’s Detention Centres

Holding ‘irregular foreigners’ in detention centres across prisons, often indefinitely, is not uncommon in Assam, human rights organisation Amnesty says.
As of data on 25 September, more than a 1,000 people were held in detention centres across the state, a documentary released by Amnesty India on Friday, 23 November, says.

The documentary – Between Fear and Hatred: Surviving Migration Detention in Assam – claims that many of those detained in such centres did not know what their crime was and why they had been separated from their families.

The release comes months after Assam had published its final draft of the National Registry of Citizens (NRC) on June 30, which had excluded the names of 40 lakh applicants.

“In fact, 30 percent of the 1,037 detainees in detention centres as on 25 September 2018 were declared foreigners in proceedings they were not even aware of. There is pressure on Tribunals to dispose off a large number of cases and that is disturbing. The authorities have totally failed to consider non-custodial alternatives to detention,” says Leah Verghese, an Amnesty India researcher who had worked on the documentary.

The documentary, which is based on studies, goes on to trace the history of the anti-migrant agitation through the 1985 Assam accord, and the situation of those detained at the 100 Foreigners Tribunals across the state.

Kismat Ali, a former detainee, talks about over-crowding and the horrors of living in such centres.

“Detention centres are overcrowded and there is no segregation between the detainees, and convicts and under-trial prisoners. The room had a capacity of 40. When we reached there, it was filled with around 120 people. There was no space. We had to live on top of each other.”

Amnesty India Chief Aakar Patel says the Assam government should remember that the constitutional right to life and personal liberty applies to all people, including migrants. Detention centres must be used as the last resort, he says.

“Our study found a number of persons who have been in detention centres for months and even years, without any access to parole. They are separated from their families and have limited contact with the outside world. Other than severely restricting movement and access to livelihood, indefinite detention has devastating effects on the mental health of those detained and their families.”

Aakar Patel, Amnesty India Head

The documentary also says that the process of updating Assam’s National Registry of Citizens (NRC) in December will only add to the detainees’ uncertainty. According to a report by the IndiaSpend, there have been at least 16 reported instances of people committing suicide for the fear of losing their citizenship.