“Disappeared in the night”: CJP’s memorandum to NHRC on Assam’s secretive detentions and illegal pushbacks CJP’s memorandum to NHRC reveals mass night-time raids, disappearances of Bengali-speaking Muslims, and extra-legal deportations
02, Jun 2025 | CJP Team
What We Know So Far: June 2, 2025
In an urgent memorandum to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), the Mumbai-based human rights organisation Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP), in collaboration with the Forum for Social Harmony and its Assam legal team, has appealed to the apex human rights body to intervene in what it describes as an “unprecedented human rights emergency” in Assam. On May 31, 2025, CJP submitted a detailed, evidence-backed memorandum alleging that, between May 23 and May 31, at least 300 individuals—mostly Bengali-speaking Muslims—were secretively detained –without arrest memo or warrant — and approximately 145 have now “disappeared” under highly suspicious and unlawful circumstances.
As detailed in the memorandum, this entire move by the Assam Border Police from May 23 onwards shrouded in secrecy, and executed with flagrant disregard for constitutional safeguards, legal procedures, and even ongoing court cases. The most chilling claim: many of those missing may have been forcibly pushed across the Indo-Bangladesh border—a move that amounts to extra-legal expulsion and, potentially, statelessness.
Every week, CJP’s dedicated team in Assam, comprising community volunteers, district volunteer motivators, and lawyers, provides vital paralegal support, counseling, and legal aid to many affected by the citizenship crisis in over 24 districts in Assam. Through our hands-on approach, 12,00,000 people successfully submitted completed NRC forms (2017-2019). We fight Foreigner Tribunal cases monthly at the district level. Through these concerted efforts, we have achieved an impressive success rate of 20 cases annually, with individuals successfully obtaining their Indian citizenship. This ground level data ensures informed interventions by CJP in our Constitutional Courts. Your support fuels this crucial work. Stand with us for Equal Rights for All #HelpCJPHelpAssam. Donate NOW!
Last Monday, May 26, CJP’s Team Assam had spent the entire day outside the Matia Detention Centre with legal aid volunteers and advocates in a bid to get information from the authorities on the identities of those detained. They found not the Jailor but the Assam Police in charge. Efforts were also made to submit a detailed memorandum to the Detention Centre authorities, citing judicial precedents and NHRC guidelines on procedures of detention and rights of detainees and families, advocate. When authorities refused to accept this, in flagrant violation of the Constitution and the law, this memorandum too has been despatched to the authorities by email and speed post. The exclusive ground report, published two days later may be read here.
The crackdown: Fear, silence, and disappearances
The CJP’s memorandum presents a grim chronology. Night raids by Assam’s Border Police reportedly swept across 33 districts from May 23 onwards, detaining individuals from their homes without warrants, memos, or explanations amounting to a form of abduction. No legal counsel was allowed. Families were left in the dark about their whereabouts or safety.
Approximately 150 detainees were later released, but at least 145 people reportedly remain untraceable—many suspected to have been dumped into “no man’s land” between India and Bangladesh.
(Note-Since the memorandum was sent on Saturday, reports of at least six persons being brought back by the BSF to the homes of the distraught, after the Bangladesh Ground Guard (BGB) refuted claims that they were Bangladeshi. Mal treatment however was meted out in the interim, and several dozen are still untraceable)
The detained include:
- Individuals who had been released on temporary bail by courts on the orders of the Supreme Court in 2021
- Citizens who were still litigating their status before Foreigners Tribunals, the Gauhati High Court, or even the Supreme Court
- People who had lived in Assam for generations and whose names appear in the National Register of Citizens (NRC)
One particularly egregious case is that of Khairul Islam, a retired government schoolteacher from Morigaon. Despite his ongoing petition in the Supreme Court, Islam was picked up by police on May 23. Days later, he appeared in a video from Bangladesh’s Kurigram district, confirming he had been forcibly expelled at 4 AM—an act tantamount to extra-judicial deportation. (Subsequent local reports on Sunday, June 1 reveal that Khairul Islam was also among one of those fortunate to have been brought back home).
Personal tragedies in the shadows of state power
CJP’s memorandum documents the lives behind the numbers, providing intimate profiles of individuals who vanished in the sweep. Among them:
- Doyjan Bibi, detained despite NRC inclusion, released on temporary bail in 2021, and now missing since May 24.
- Abdul Sheikh, a senior citizen displaced multiple times by communal violence, disappeared after the May 24 crackdown.
- Mojibor Sheikh, a daily wage labourer whose minor son was forced to drop out of school to support the family after Mojibor’s detention; now untraceable.
- Samsul Ali, 67, with valid legacy documents from 1951, disappeared despite suffering from chronic health conditions.
All of these had been legally temporarily released in prior years and actively engaging with the justice system, but were now forcibly removed without notice—rendered voiceless and invisible.
A legal, constitutional, and humanitarian catastrophe
CJP’s memorandum is not just a plea for redress—it is a devastating indictment of what it calls a “stealth administrative purge” targeting a vulnerable minority community.
Key legal violations identified:
- Constitutional Rights:
- Article 21: Right to life and personal liberty
- Article 22: Right to be informed of the grounds of arrest and access to legal counsel
- Supreme Court Precedents:
- D.K. Basu, Joginder Kumar, Vihaan Kumar: All mandating transparency, legal access, and procedural safeguards during arrests and detentions
- Statutory Breaches:
- Numerous provisions of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) and the former CrPC, including rights to bail, medical care, and judicial oversight, were reportedly flouted
- NHRC’s Own Arrest Guidelines (2000):
- Not followed—no arrest registers, no medical checks, no access to families or advocates, no transparency
- International Law:
- ICCPR, UDHR, and customary international law explicitly prohibit arbitrary detention, expulsion without due process, and pushbacks—particularly under the principle of non-refoulement
CJP warns that these acts not only violate India’s international legal obligations but may amount to collective punishment and ethnic profiling—practices wholly antithetical to a constitutional democracy.
Justice denied: Non-exhaustion of legal remedies
A central legal concern raised is that many individuals had not exhausted judicial remedies. Some, like Khairul Islam, had active cases in the Supreme Court. Others were in the process of securing permanent bail or challenging ex-parte FT orders.
By detaining and disappearing them before legal processes concluded, the State effectively:
- Short-circuited the rule of law
- Undermined court jurisdiction
- Violated natural justice
This, CJP argues, is not just “procedural impropriety” but an act of executive overreach and constitutional breakdown.
Breach of Supreme Court directives in Rajubala Das
CJP points to the Supreme Court’s 2024 ruling in Rajubala Das v. Union of India, which directed strict compliance with legal procedures before deportation—such as:
- Submission of Nationality Verification Requests (NVRs) to Bangladesh
- Issuance of travel permits
- Public documentation of deportation orders
The memorandum demands that NHRC urgently verify whether these formalities were observed in any of the 145+ suspected pushbacks. If not, the Assam government may be in contempt of court, and liable for gross human rights violations.
CJP’s prayers: Urgent action, transparency, and accountability
CJP has called on the NHRC to:
- Demand full disclosure within 72 hours from the Assam government and Ministry of Home Affairs, including:
- Names and details of all detainees, released persons, and those missing
- Legal basis and authority under which arrests were made
- Detention orders, FT case numbers, and status of deportation procedures
- Constitute a fact-finding committee to visit Matia Detention Centre and affected villages, record testimonies, and report publicly within 10 days
- Issue binding guidelines against arbitrary detentions and mass expulsions
- Initiate legal and disciplinary action against officers responsible
- Restore liberty to all unlawfully detained individuals
- Create a real-time detainee tracking system and helpline
The memorandum closes with a stirring reminder: The Constitution does not allow governments to extinguish liberty in silence, nor abandon citizens to exile without due process. If confirmed, these disappearances and pushbacks mark a turning point not only for Assam but for Indian democracy itself.
CJP’s urgent appeal is as much a legal petition as it is a moral alarm bell. It demands that India’s institutions act now—firmly and transparently—to restore faith in the rule of law before irreparable damage is done.
The complete memorandum may be read below.
Related:
From Detention to Deportation: The mass deportations and detention crisis at Assam’s Matia centre
Indian again! Matleb Ali’s fight to prove Indian identity ends with CJP’s intervention
