“I received a letter just before I left office from a man. I don’t know why he chose to write it, but I’m glad he did. He wrote that you can go to live in France, but you can’t become a Frenchman. You can go to live in Germany or Italy, but you can’t become a German, an Italian. He went through Turkey, Greece, Japan and other countries. But he said anyone, from any corner of the world, can come to live in the United States and become an American”. Thus spoke US President Ronald Reagan on 19 January 1989, in his farewell speech.

The ugly spectre of American military aircraft bringing back handcuffed and shackled illegal immigrants to countries as far apart as India and Guatemala are a direct repudiation of the liberal ethos of successive US Governments, since President Washington’s time. Significantly, China and Cuba have refused to accept the US deportation flights. Such humiliating treatment of our citizens is definitely in – consistent with our country’s image of a Vishwaguru, and the Government’s claims of a rapidly advancing nation which had opportunities for everyone. The possibility of many more such flights, even if not so well-publicised, is extremely high, as the US has a very large number of illegal Indian immigrants.

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Estimates vary widely between 7,00,000 (Pew Research Centre and Centre for Migration Studies of New York), 3,75,000 (Migration Policy Institute), 2,20,000 (Department of Homeland Security) and 18,000 (migrants identified by the US for deportation). In his recent meeting with President Trump, PM Modi said India would take back its nationals who were in the US illegally, and also crack down on the “human trafficking ecosystem.” However, illegal migration, the pace of which has quickened considerably over the last few years, has been taking place for a long time, and the Government’s claim of having noted its enormity only after the US started deporting illegal immigrants does not ring true. Stories of how the deportees made their journey to the US make for sad reading.

A typical account reads: X paid Rs 42 lakh to be trafficked through multiple countries: Qatar, Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Panama, Nicaragua, and Mexico. X said: “We walked for days… crossed mo – untains and nearly drowned. I saw one man die in the Panama jungle…” Most of these unfortunate people are from villages and were sent to the Mexico border through circuitous routes by unscrupulous traffickers. After having spent between Rs.50 lakh to Rs.1 crore, illegal immigrants, some with families and small children, crossed into the US by jumping over the USMexico wall ~ to be arrested and held in detention centres. With productive assets sold, and having to repay loans taken at usurious rates to pay traffickers, the unsuccessful migrants look at a difficult future.

Earlier, after detention, such immigrants could give asylum requests that remained undecided for years, allowing the person to do odd jobs, and eventually settle down in the US. Now, Trump has changed US policy, and immigrants are being deported from detention centres without any hearing, and the chickens have literally come home to roost. The US is unapologetic about the treatment meted out to illegal immigrants. The White House press secretary posted pictures of handcuffed migrants tied together and walking towards a military plane on X. Her post read, “Deportation flights have begun.

President Trump is sending a strong and clear message to the entire world: if you illegally enter the United States of America, you will face severe consequences.” The US Border Patrol Chief Michael W Banks went further, posting a 24-second video on X, showing handcuffed and shackled migrants, accompanied by a statement, “… successfully returned illegal aliens to India, marking the farthest deportation flight yet using military transport.

This mission underscores our commitment to en – forcing immigration laws…” The White House put a post for Valentine’s Day on X, Facebook, and Instagram: “Roses are red/Violets are blue/come here illegally/and we’ll deport you.” Indian officialdom is quiet on these repatriations but PM Modi had stated in Washington: “These are children of very ordinary families, and they are (were) lured by big dreams and promises.” Other statements by various worthies shame the victims, obliquely putting the blame on migrants. However, the problem is much more widespread; one finds Indians in the war zones of Russia, the benighted deserts of Iraq and almost everywhere they should not be.

Once the plight of people stuck in such dreadful places is amplified by their friends and relatives, the Government brings them back, after a lot of hand wringing. One may very well ask what the Government was doing when human traffickers were ensnaring these gullible people? The traffickers behind the illegal migrants to the US, are well identified, but generally roam free. While a US court has sentenced two Indian nationals, for facilitating the illegal border crossing of an IndianGujarati family of four that froze to death at the Canadian border in 2022, their co-conspirators in India were arrested only recently. The Punjab agents are still at large, with deportees unwilling to identify them, and the Government dragging its feet. Almost every person seeking asylum in a foreign country alleges State persecution, because of his caste or religion.

The very fact that such spiels are believed by foreign governments while granting asylum is a poor reflection on our soft power, and the immense persuasive powers of immigration lawyers. However, a different reality emerges in interaction with the illegal migrants: the real reasons for their migration are economic and societal. Young persons try to go abroad as they believe that Western countries offer more opportunities for them, and in any case, ‘foreign returned’ people are considered superior. Also, it would appear that some people, due to straitened circumstances, see no future in India ~ given half a chance, they would leave the country for whichever place their trafficker takes them to. The dire employment situation in India, which has an unemployment rate of 29.1 per cent for graduates, and 33.90 per cent for male post-graduates, and 41.49 per cent for female post-graduates in the 15-29 age group, is the major cause for the flight of young people. Fearing public questioning over rising unemployment the Government discontinued publication of data on employment in 2017-18, leading to recurring controversies about employment statistics.

An instance about the misleading nature of the narrative being proffered would suffice. In an article in a leading newspaper on 28 April 2018, relying on CMIE data, a Member of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, concluded that 15 million jobs were created in 2017, as against an average of 4 million jobs per year in UPA times. Shortly thereafter, in another article in the same newspaper, the Managing Director (MD) of CMIE, observed that the claim of creation of 15 million jobs was absolutely false; rather incomparable data sets, cherry picking, and dubious statistical analyses were behind the claims of robust employment growth. According to the MD, only 1.4 million jobs were added in 2017. Again, on 2 May 2018, in an article in another newspaper, a former Vice-Chairman of the NITI Aayog claimed that instead of the generally accepted figure of 12 million job entrants in a given year, the number of job entrants was only 7.5 to 7.8 million per year.

This naturally left readers confused; all economists involved in the debate were highly respected, yet all were canvassing diametrically opposite conclusions, like historians debating the outcome of the battle of Haldighati. Moreover, a conjoint reading of what both Government economists had written would have us believe that job creation was galloping at twice the rate at which job-seekers were entering the job market. This is palpably false; according to CMIE data the number of unemployed in India keeps increasing by the day. The situation has not improved so far.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that the lot of the educated unemployed is pitiable; persons with postgraduate qualifications and engineering and management degrees routinely apply for class four Government jobs. An advertisement for the post of 60,000 constables in UP attracted 50 lakh applications. Similarly, for 2,83,747 vacancies notified by the Railways in 2018- 19, more than four crore applications were received. Floored by the sheer volume of responses, recruitment has not been completed till now. Thus, not brushing the unemployment problem under the carpet, but creating job opportunities for our youth may be the only way to avoid such humiliating situations in future.

(The writer is a retired Principal Chief Commissioner of Income-Tax)