Rohingya refugees

Rohingya refugees have been living in the outskirts of Jammu for years together and now the JK administration has started an exercise for the deportation of them settled in the Jammu region by sending around 155 Myanmar nationals to Hiranagar Jail, which is being referred to as a holding centre by the government.

Earlier also many right wing political parties in the past few years have been asking for their deportation from Jammu region and the previous political dispensations after police verification allowed them to live their lives in the region.

But recently police in Jammu told the media that after verification, 155 Rohingya refugees staying in Jammu and Kashmir were sent to the Hiranagar jail. The police described the Hiragar jail as a holding center for Rohingya, saying they have invoked Section 3(2) e of the Foreigners Act.

The police insisted that the immigrants were not holding valid travel documents required in terms of Section (3) of the Passports Act. They said the exercise of identifying more such immigrants is still in progress. The government had ordered shifting of all inmates lodged in Hiranagar Jail of Kathua district to other prisons of Jammu and Kashmir.

Ali Johar, co-director of the Rohingya Human Rights Initiative, a Delhi-based NGO, recently told the media in Jammu that some groups over the years fuelled hatred against the Rohingya in the minds of local people and they are not seen as humans.