Sheikh Hasina will likely remain in India for some time, as her plans to travel to the United Kingdom faced a “technical roadblock.” WHAT IS THE TECHNICAL ROADBLOCK? Along with her sister, the ex-PM had reportedly planned to seek asylum in the UK, where members of their family live. However, according to the country’s immigration rules, asylum requests can only be processed once a person is in the UK and Hasina does not hold a visa for travelling there. DOES INDIA HAVE A REFUGEE POLICY? India has decided to let her stay in the country despite the lack of an official policy on refugees. The question of how refugees should be treated has come up again in the past, most recently and prominently with the entry of Rohingya refugees from Myanmar.

WHO IS A REFUGEE?

Under the 1951 UN Convention on the Status of Refugees and the subsequent 1967 Protocol, the word refugee pertains to any person who is outside their country of origin and unable or unwilling to return owing to well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion. Stateless persons may also be refugees in this sense, where the country of origin (citizenship) is understood as ‘country of former habitual residence’. (Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies) WHO ARE THE ROHINGYAS AND HOW IS INDIA DEALING WITH THEM? The UN has said the flight of the Rohingya following the Myanmar military crackdown in Rakhine state in 2017 had created the world’s biggest refugee crisis. Cox’s Bazaar in Bangladesh is the biggest refugee camp in the world today. Myanmar maintains that the Rohingya, who are predominantly Muslim, are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. When it comes to dealing with some 40,000 Rohingya who fled to India, the government’s response has been ambiguous. The government had allowed the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to carry out verification and provide some of them with identity cards. There is a demand that they be “deported” immediately.

INDIA, REFUGEES & THE UN CONVENTION

  • India has welcomed refugees in the past, with nearly 300,000 people categorised as refugees.
    • This includes the Tibetans, Chakmas from Bangladesh, and refugees from Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, etc.
  • But India is not a signatory to the 1951 UN Convention or the 1967 Protocol. Nor does India have a refugee policy or a refugee law.
    • This has allowed India to keep its options open on the question of refugees.
    • The government can declare any set of refugees as illegal immigrants — as has happened with Rohingya despite the UNHCR verification — and decide to deal with them as trespassers under the Foreigners Act or the Indian Passport Act.
  • The closest India has come to a refugee policy in recent years is the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019, which discriminates between refugees based on religion in offering them Indian citizenship.