Kolkata: A single-judge bench of Calcutta High Court, on Thursday, stayed a decision of the West Bengal correctional services department for deportation of four Rohingya convicts to Myanmar with immediate effect. The single-judge bench of Justice Moushumi Bhattacharya also directed the state correctional services department to arrange for all the basic amenities to the four Rohingya inmates.
These four Rohingya individuals are currently inmates of the Dum Dum Central Correctional Home in the northern outskirts of Kolkata. Recently, the correctional home authorities also informed them that they will have to go back to Myanmar.
The four Rohinghya inmates drew the attention of Justice Bhattacharya’s bench in this connection. Justice Bhattacharya asked the counsels for both the Union government and the state government whether there was any specific instruction on this count.
Both Dhiraj Trivedi, the counsel for the Union government and Anirban Roy, the counsel for the state government, informed that the bench denied knowledge of any such order.
Thereafter, Justice Bhattacharya directed that in the current situation the four petitioners cannot be pushed back to Myanmar. She also ordered that till the time the matter of their repatriation is finally settled the Dum Dum Central Correctional Home authorities will have to arrange for their basic amenities of living.
The matter will be heard again on August 10, 2022. Justice Bhattacharya asked the counsel of the petitioners to present all the documents related to the matter in the form of an affidavit by that date.
(IANS)
