General News
Till I go home
India’s refugee policy is guided by political compulsions and not rights enabling obligations
“We left our home years ago to escape the tough times we were facing back there. We knew we were not leaving for a better future. Living each day is a challenge,” says Kyaw Than, who escaped Myanmar during student uprising and coming of military Junta government. India has been his home for last twenty years.
Waiting to be declared a refugee, getting Subsistence Allowance (SA) for few months, then being on your own in India where the refugees have no right to work, not being able to speak the language, lack of resources and being subjected suspicions make a refugee’s life no less than a struggle.
India has been hospitable host of refugees from across the world. New Delhi is host to the largest UNHCR-recognised population of urban refugees in the world. According to Delhi based PILSARC, Public Interest Legal Support And Research Center, nearly 1, 44,000 Sri Lankan Tamils and 1, 11,000 Tibetans comprise of majority of refugees. Apart from these there are around 8528 refugees from Afghanistan, 2952 from Myanmar and 960 refugees from other countries like Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Iraq, Palestine and others (UNHCR, 2009).
Crossing the borders
Arjit Singh, an Afghani Sikh who came to India in 1992 gets nostalgic of the good times he saw in Kabul. “It was all good till Najeeb government fell in the early 1990s and Mujahiddeens took over. There was plunder, rape and loot. While escaping from Kabul, our truck was stopped in between by a group of men with guns. But somehow, we escaped,” he recalls. He now lives in Tilak Nagar with other Afghan Hindu and Sikh refugee families who have tried to start from a scratch. They set up a voluntary organisation Khalsa Diwan Welfare Society in Tilak Nagar in 1993 which has tuition centers, vocational training centers and computer centers to ensure that refugees from Afghanistan, especially children are able to be self-reliant. Arjit Singh, Joint Secretary of Khalsa Diwan, feels that similarity of culture, religion and language was one of the factors of easy assimilation. He got citizenship of India in 2007. Support of his community and UNHCR helped all these refugees.
The real ‘foreign’ mass influx came in 1959 to India from Tibet. By early 1980s the Sri Lankan Tamils had started coming. The government took care of concerns of Tibetans and Sri Lankans. To deal with individual arrival of refugees from other countries, UNHCR office resumed its operations in 1981(it had an office in India before).
“Any person who wants to claim the refugee status can register with us. After an interview a person is given refugee status, which is given on well founded basis of fear of prosecution in their country. There on, we give him /her SA for three months,” explains Nayana Bose, Associate External Relations Officer, UNHCR, Delhi. SA is given depending upon size of the family and the SA may be extended depending on various factors.
According to Liban, a refugee from Somalia, who lives in Delhi, UNHCR assistance is not enough. “We receive financial assistance from UNHCR only for a couple of months. Despite being educated, all of us are not able to work as India does not permit refugees to work. From where do we arrange our accommodation rent, expenses for diseases .We ask our relatives to send money. We cannot be beggars all our life,” he asserts.
UNHRC, however, does want to create dependency. “We have our implementing partners- Don Bosco Ashayalam that helps with imparting of vocational skill training that lead to small income generating programs, YMCA that looks after the education of refugee children and NDYMCA looks after the access to nearest public health care system. We also have advocacy partners like PILSARC that have give them legal guidance and counseling,” Nayana Bose. Also, India allows them to work in unorganized sector.
Absence of a refugee law
In absence of statutory framework to deal with refugees, India relies on the Foreigners Act, 1946, to govern the entry, stay and exit of foreigners giving
Ahmed, name changed, a jail doctor from Iran came to India three years ago. “Since me and my family were under threat, we fled and came to India. As refuges cannot work in India, so Don Bosco asked my son to work in a factory and he got only one rupee by assembling the kit on the radio. Their working hours were from 9 a.m to 5 p.m in which they could make maximum 10 kits per day which comes to 10 rupees per day. But it takes Rs20 just to reach his factory. Expenses are increasing as my wife is very ill,” he says. Despite being a qualified doctor, he is struggling to meet his ends.
powers to executive to remove foreigners from India inviting instant deportation, without any reason. All the foreigners, including economic migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers are put in one category. Hence there is no special protection for the refugees. Moreover India is not a signatory to 1951 Geneva Convention or its 1967 Protocol that clearly spelt out rights of the refugees.
However, there are few rights enjoyed by the refugees under the Constitution. Article 14 guarantees equality before law and Article 21 protects any one from the deprivation of his life or personal liberty. They also have right to practice their religion. More over India has signed a number of international conventions like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, International Convention on Civil and Economic and Political Rights and so on
India’s refugee policy is thus guided by political compulsions and not rights
“Money is a big problem. Both me and my wife are ill and have had operations. Despite all this many women have to go out to work. They face a lot of problems of harassment many times. For them our women are easy prey,” says Zaw Zaw from Myanmar, who lives in Delhi. UNHCR has opened a Women’s Protection Centre in Vikaspuri, Delhi where there is counseling and profiling of all Burmese women. “And of course we are not able to adjust as we do share same language, eating habits and culture,” says his wife.
enabling obligations. Thus India’s policy is crises centric, ad hoc and does not give enough rights to the refuges
There are many who are voicing for need of a refugee law as they feel the current infrastructure does mot impart full rights to them. “Though many people feel its right to not to have a law as it concerns the security of the nation but foreigners come in and go any way. Having a law will actually give identity to these refugees and give them rights,” says Ravi Nair, director of South Asian Human Rights Documentation Centre
PILSARC, in 2006, introduced a Refugees and Asylum Seekers (protection) Bill. “The coming of the law will define who a refugee is, help differentiate a refugee from other category of foreigners, give them a subset of rights and the system will no more be ad hoc, as the law will give power to judiciary and hence the executive will respond,” says Bipin Aspatwar, lawyer, PILSARC
Many refugees claim that they have troubles with implementing partners like
Abdi Said, a refugee from Somalia says that he was attacked while living in Hyderabad. “We all left Somalia due to Civil War. But this is also no peaceful life. After I was attacked by locals, I was not helped by police. It is difficult to get accommodation as people have there own suspicions. They think of us as drug dealers. My friend Liban was jailed for a month only for protesting. We feel there is a bias against Somalians. Very few Somalian refugees have been sent to other countries,” he says. One of the solutions that UNHCR has is resettlement in other countries.
YMCA and Don Bosco. Shahana Basavapatna, a lawyer working closely with refugees, feels that there has to be greater transparency. “Many refugees feel that there are biases or are generally dissatisfied. It would be better if UNHCR can be more approachable. The communication gap has to be filled. There have to more interactions between refugees and UNHCR. There has to be efficiency and transparency at ground level. That is the implementing partners should also be reachable. The activities and programs conducted by them should be more in number,” she explains.
Ravi Nair says that USA has the one the best integration policies. “In USA you have one community officers and one community looking after the integration of a refugee group. May be we can do the same,” he tells. They can be engaged in various cultural performances like theatre around the country and earn money. It would also help them divert their minds of the troubled times they faced.
“With such a life, we cannot stop thinking about our home. Many of my friends died in jail in Myanmar. Many were in concentration camp. It has been years since I heard voices of my family members. But with the current situation prevailing in our country, we do not wish to go back. Life did not give us choices. We feel handicapped,” says Kyaw Than. Silence follows.
(This story, data, statistics and quotes are relevant as of 2011)
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