US deported over 1,100 illegal migrants from India in 12 months

NEW DELHI: The US deported more than 1,100 illegal migrants from India between October 2023 and September 2024 and more needs to be done to raise awareness about the consequences of using unlawful migration pathways and the role of unscrupulous travel agencies, a senior American official said on Tuesday.

In addition to the people sent back during the last US fiscal year that ended in September, about 100 illegal migrants were repatriated to India on charter flight on October 22. There has been a “steady increase” in deportations of illegal Indian migrants from the US in recent years, said Royce Murray, assistant secretary for border and immigration policy at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

The US is continuing to strengthen its working relationship with the Indian government to tackle this issue and is “very pleased” with the cooperation it has received so far from New Delhi, Murray told an online briefing.

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“In fiscal year 2024, which just concluded at the end of September, the US repatriated over 1,100 Indian nationals. That has been part of a steady increase of removals from the US of Indian nationals over the past few years,” she said.

Asked specifically about a charter flight operated on October 22 by DHS to send illegal migrants back to India, Murray said such “large-scale charter flights typically have over 100 individuals”. This flight had a mix of men and women, was a “smooth operation” that had “excellent cooperation from the government in India”, she added.

Murray didn’t provide details of the total number of charter flights operated by the DHS to deport illegal migrants in the last US fiscal but said some persons were also sent back on commercial flights. She also said higher numbers of people from the Americas and the Western Hemisphere attempt to illegally enter the US than from places such India, which are further away.

“We are continuing to strengthen our working relationship with the government of India across a range of issues and welcome the partnership that we have had and know we will continue to have so that we can better address the challenges [such as] the use of human smugglers or unscrupulous travel agencies that are preying on vulnerable migrants and providing them with false information,” she said.

“We have been very pleased with the cooperation we are receiving from the government of India and look forward to that relationship growing even stronger.”

People familiar with the matter said on condition of anonymity that the Indian side has been cooperating with the US on this issue as tackling illegal migration is a priority for both countries. “We want people to go abroad for work or studies through legal means. This isn’t a problem with just the US but also several other countries,” one of the people cited above said.

Murray acknowledged that more needs to be done by both sides to increase awareness about the consequences of illegal migration. “I agree the need to do robust public messaging to ensure that people have good information about how to access lawful pathways to the US and the consequences for failing to use lawful pathways and attempting to irregularly migrate to the US is critically important,” she said.

“We need to do more to be able to reach people, whether they are unaccompanied children, or other individuals who are seeking to migrate irregularly and could fall prey to these unscrupulous actors.”

Young people interested in studying in the US have been a target of human trafficking and illegal immigration rings and both sides have to ensure that they have accurate information about student visas.