The Delhi Police has arrested 66 undocumented Bangladeshi immigrants living in the Wazirpur Jhuggi Jhopdi Colony and New Subzi Mandi areas of the national capital, PTI quoted an officer as saying on Monday.

Among those arrested are 20 men, 16 women and 30 children. They were apprehended on Friday during a special drive to identify undocumented foreign nationals living in informal settlements, reported The Indian Express.

The police said that those arrested had recently relocated to the northwestern parts of Delhi from the Nuh district of Haryana, where they worked in brick kilns.

“These families had relocated to Delhi following intensified enforcement actions against illegal immigrants by the police, as well as widespread media coverage of such operations,” Bhisham Singh, the deputy commissioner of police (northwest), was quoted as saying by The Indian Express.

Singh claimed that the families started living in densely populated and informal localities to avoid detection.

Their arrest is part of an ongoing drive to detect undocumented foreign nationals in Delhi, the officer added.

On December 10, Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena had ordered that a special drive be launched against alleged undocumented immigrants from Bangladesh.

After the order, the police have arrested several persons whom they claim are undocumented Bangladeshi immigrants.

On May 30, the Delhi Police arrested four Bangladeshi nationals who were living in North Delhi’s Narela without valid documents. A day earlier, five Bangladeshi nationals, including three minors, were arrested from Anand Vihar in East Delhi, reported The Hindu.

The Delhi Police’s Crime Branch on May 16 said that it had arrested nine undocumented Bangladeshi nationals, including five children, from Auchungi village in the northwestern part of the city.

On May 3, the police said they had busted a network to bring Bangladeshi nationals to India without required documents. Forty-seven undocumented Bangladeshi nationals and five Indian nationals were reportedly arrested as part of the operation.

India’s push back of ‘foreigners’

The arrests come against the backdrop of India “pushing back” alleged undocumented immigrants to Bangladesh.

On Monday, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that his government has “pushed back” 303 “foreigners” and will continue to do so under the 1950 Immigrants (Expulsion from Assam) Act.

“Another 35 is in our hand and they will be sent once the [flood] waters recede,” the Bharatiya Janata Party leader told the state Assembly. “The Supreme Court clearly said the illegal expulsion act is valid and if the government wishes, they can expel the foreigners without going to Foreigners Tribunals.”

The Supreme Court, while hearing the challenges to Section 6A of the 1955 Citizenship Act, had said that “there is no legal requirement for the Assam government to always approach the judiciary in order to identify foreigners”, Sarma had told reporters on Saturday.

In October, the Supreme Court had upheld the constitutional validity of Section 6A of the 1955 Citizenship Act.

Section 6A was introduced as a special provision under the Act when the Assam Accord was signed between the Union government and leaders of the Assam Movement in 1985. It allows foreigners who came to Assam between January 1, 1966, and March 25, 1971, to seek Indian citizenship.

Indigenous groups in Assam have alleged that this provision in the Act had legalised infiltration by migrants from Bangladesh.

The chief minister also told the Assembly that two to four persons, who had received a stay from the Supreme Court and the High Court against their deportations, were also “pushed back”.

“Through the diplomatic channel, we have also brought them back,” Sarma added.

Also read: Assam teacher ‘pushed’ into Bangladesh returns home two weeks after being detained