The Gauhati High Court on Wednesday directed the Ministry of External Affairs and the Assam government to trace the whereabouts of a woman who was expelled to Bangladesh in June after being declared a foreigner, The Times of India reported.
As Scroll had reported, Mumtaz Begum’s family realised that she had been forced out of the country after her husband, Mujammel Hoque, filed a habeas corpus petition in the High Court.
Begum was taken into custody on May 30 after a foreigners tribunal declared that she was not an Indian citizen. About two weeks later, she was expelled to Bangladesh.
Foreigners tribunals are quasi-judicial bodies unique to Assam that decide matters of nationality based on documentary evidence.
A bench comprising Justices Kalyan Rai Surana and Pranjal Das noted that Begum had neither been provided a copy of the tribunal’s order nor given an opportunity to challenge it, NDTV reported.
“In the meantime, the Ministry of External Affairs as well as the State machinery [should] take steps to ascertain the whereabouts of the declared foreigner,” the newspaper quoted the bench as saying.
The next hearing is scheduled for November 6.
In September, the High Court had asked the foreigners tribunal to reconsider its decision in Begum’s case, saying that it had not considered all the evidence she had submitted while deciding that she was a foreigner.
The court had also directed...