CHANDIGARH: A special US Air Force plane C17 Globemaster III carrying 112 Indians landed at the Amritsar International Airport late on Sunday night.
This is the third such flight bringing deportees as part of a crackdown by the Donald Trump administration against illegal immigrants. The plane landed at the airport at 10:03 pm, said sources.
Sources said that the plane from the US landed at Sri Guru Ram Dass Jee International Airport in Amritsar today and there were 112 deportees on board.
Among them, 31 are from Punjab, 44 from Haryana, 33 from Gujarat, two from Uttar Pradesh and one each from Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. In the further break up there were 89 men and 23 women on this flight including minors.
Among the 31 individuals from Punjab, 10 illegal immigrants had gone to the US in January this year and 21 of them had gone last year and are in the age group of 18 to 43 years age group. Two women are the state are also among the deported, sources said.
Sources said that after the security clearance, immigration and background check the deportees will be sent back to their homes. Those who hail from Punjab will be taken to their homes in Punjab Police vehicles. It is expected that around 2 am on Monday, these illegal immigrants will come out of the airport.
Sources said that the women and children were not restrained during the flight.
Haryana government sent a Volvo bus to the Amritsar airport to transport back the men and women who belong to the state.
AAP-led Punjab Government slammed BJP-led Haryana Government for sending police buses to Amritsar airport to take back its first and second batch of residents deported from the US.
Punjab NRI Affairs Minister Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal said Indian youth, already humiliated by the authorities in the US which brought them in shackles, are being tortured further by being made to travel to their hometowns in Haryana in police buses.
He said the Haryana Transport Minister Anil Vij could not make any special arrangements for the deportees from Haryana.
"The deportees from Gujarat and other states are expected to be flown tomorrow morning from Amritsar to their respective destinations which is being coordinated by the union government, ‘’ said an official.
Although the families of deportees have gathered at the airport, it is expected that they will not be allowed to meet them. More than a dozen families had come to receive the deportees yesterday, however, they were not allowed to meet them and were sent directly to their home town in police vehicles.
Yesterday late night a US military plane carrying 117 illegal Indian immigrants, including 65 from Punjab, landed at the Amritsar airport around 11.30 pm. On February 5, the first flight from US landed at Amritsar with 104 deportees on board. In both these instances, the deportees were handcuffed and their legs were chained.
This is part of an ongoing crackdown by US immigration authorities on individuals who entered the country illegally or overstayed their visas.
Meanwhile, Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann yesterday asked Union Government not to make the holy city of Amritsar as a “deport centre.”
He had on Saturday evening visited the Amritsar International Airport ahead of the arrival of the second plane bringing 117 illegal Indian deportees from the US as this was the second such batch of Indians to be deported by the Donald Trump administration as part of its promised crackdown on illegal migration.
"Do not make our holy city (Amritsar) a deport centre,” Mann had said and added that the state government has made transportation arrangements for taking deportees hailing from Punjab to their respective hometowns.
