As many as forty-five Hindu refugees from the Islamic Republic of Pakistan were detained in Gujarat’s Banaskantha for ‘overstaying’.
They were detained after their visas expired and their applications for long-term visas (LTV) were rejected, a police official said on Sunday.
They were detained from Akoli village here and the process to send them back to Pakistan was underway, PTI has quoted local intelligence bureau police inspector Santosh Dhobi as saying.
“These Pakistani nationals were in India to visit Haridwar in Uttarakhand and came to Banaskantha to meet their relatives. They were in India for the last two months on a valid Visa. They were overstaying as their visas expired and their LTVs were not approved,” Dhobi added.
Hindus have been continuously persecuted in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan since its inception in 1947.
Notably, the Centre had brought the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) in December 2019 to fast-track citizenship for persecuted religious minorities—Hindus, Jains, Parsis, Sikhs, Buddhists, and Christians—from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh who had arrived here before the end of December 2014. However, the Union government is yet to frame rules for it.
