As Assam’s declared foreigners go ‘missing’ in police crackdown, panicked families seek answers

At 3 am on May 24, the police arrived at 42-year-old Manikjan Begum’s home in Assam’s Darrang district.

They took her along, and asked her family to report to the Dhula police station during the day. About 12 hours later, she was let go, after the police verified her documents.

The next day, Begum, who was declared a foreigner by a foreigners’ tribunal in 2018, was summoned to the police station again, her son said. Foreigner tribunals are quasi-judicial bodies unique to Assam, which rule on citizenship cases.

On her second visit to the police station, Begum’s husband accompanied her, along with her eight-month-old daughter.

“From the Dhula police station, she was taken to the police reserve in Mangaldai. She was made to sit there till 1 pm and again taken to the office of the superintendent of police,” said Barek Ali, the 22-year-old eldest son.

Ali claims that the family members last saw her, with her baby, on the afternoon of May 25 at the office of the superintendent of border police. “We waited at the SP’s office till 8 pm, but she did not come out,” he said.

For the next two days, Begum’s family members kept visiting the Dhula police station and Darrang SP’s office. “We kept going back to the police...

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