Shivani Gadhavi –
Published On: December 10, 2021 at 19:20 IST
The Gauhati High Court found three orders of the Foreigners’ Tribunal to be erratic, incomplete and sent to the wrong address within the time period of a month. The three orders of the Foreigners’ Tribunal declared ‘as many people’ as foreigners.
The Foreigners’ Tribunal of Western Assam’s Bongaigaon district had served a notice to Pushparani Dhar, a woman in her 70s, after which she was declared a foreigner in 2017. Pushparani Dhar complained about being harassed by such notices of Foreigners’ Tribunal since 2000.
The Gauhati High Court showed its concerns towards her case and found that the lady has sufficient documents to prove her Indian citizenship. The documents consisting of a certificate of her father Hirendra Nath Pal from the Bengal Medical Union and papers regarding the employment of her husband Mrinal Kanti Dhar in the railways in 1962.
After a period of two weeks, the High Court found that the Foreigners’ Tribunal had declared Sukdev Ree (now deceased) as a foreigner, who was imprisoned for three years. The Court has made the tribunal to reopen his case which will be heard in front of his family on December 14th, 2021.
The Gauhati High Court also set aside an ex parte order of the Foreigners’ Tribunal against Silchar based Jantu Das. Jantu Das had approached the High Court after the Tribunal declared him to be a foreigner in 2017.
The Tribunal had ruled that it had sent several notices to Jantu Das over a period of 10 years before the declaration. The High Court later on found out that the Tribunal sent the notices to a wrong address all along.
The Bench of Justice N. Kotiswar Singh and Justice Malashri Nandi stated, “After going through the documents submitted, we have learnt that the petitioner never received any notice from the foreigners’ tribunal and, as such, the ex parte order is illegal and liable to be set aside.”