Kargil War veteran Mohammed Sanaullah returned home on Saturday from a detention centre for foreigners at Goalpara in western Assam 24 hours after the Gauhati High Court granted him bail.
A Foreigners’ Tribunal on May 23 declared the 52-year-old retired Army Honorary Captain a “foreigner”. He was lodged in the detention centre on May 28.
The ex-serviceman, originally from a village from western Assam’s Boko, reached his Guwahati residence in the evening. He walked out of the Goalpara centre in the morning but was brought to Amingaon in Kamrup district where the State’s Border Police lodged the case against him in 2008.
Mr. Sanaullah was formally released after the district authorities obtained the biometrics of the iris of his eyes and fingerprints of both hands, and conducted a health check-up as was ordered by the court.
“I am grateful to the court for granting bail to me. I also thank all others who extended their help to me and prayed for me. But I won’t comment on my detention as the matter is sub judice,” he said.
‘Poor facilities’
The ex-serviceman, however, said there were some issues regarding hygiene and sanitation in the detention centre. “The Goalpara centre has 230-240 declared foreigners, some of them very poor and cannot fight their cases in the court,” he added.
His wife, Samina Begum, said her husband’s return was an Id gift. “We observed roza during Ramzan, but did not celebrate Id because of his detention. Our festival has started with his arrival,” she said. Mr. Sanaullah had been a soldier for 30 years and retired from the Army in August 2017.
He joined the Border Police — ironically tasked with detecting and detaining foreigners — in December 2018 as a sub-inspector. The Border Police dismissed him from service on May 29.