Indians are among the 3,120 failed asylum seekers deported from Britain between July and September this year.
LONDON: Indians are among the 3,120 failed asylum seekers deported from Britain between July and September this year.
Figures published by the Home Office revealed that the top five nationalities of failed asylum seekers during the period were Pakistan, Afghanistan, Serbia and Turkey, besides India. The country-wide break up of the figures was, however, not available.
A source in the Indian High Commissioner told on Thursday that failed asylum seekers and those with criminal records were deported as a matter of routine and the latest figures were being compiled.
Asylum applications from Indian citizens usually fail because the country is not considered dangerous.
Apart from deporting failed asylum seekers, Britain will soon begin deporting foreign criminals currently lodged in jails for various offences. The Government planned to deport 4,000 foreign prisoners this year as part of its effort to clear the overcrowded prisons in the UK.
Despite promises to clear a backlog of up to 285,000 foreign nationals, fewer than 1,000 were deported in September. At the same time, the number of asylum seekers arriving in the country was double of that figure.
Referring to 18 per cent fall in the deportation compared to the previous year, David Davis, the shadow home secretary, said, "This is another sign that the Government's tough talk on immigration and asylum is not matched by effective action.
"The fall in the number of removals means the Government is failing completely to make inroads into the backlog of half a million people who have no right to be in this country."
The Government claimed the reason for the drop was that officials were concentrating on deporting foreign criminals and illegal workers.
Liam Byrne, the Immigration Minister, who is scheduled to visit India shortly, said the overall deportations were running at around 45,000 for the year.
Byrne said "the first people we should send home are those who break British laws. We're removing record numbers of foreign criminals including illegal workers who risk undercutting UK wages."
A report from Coventry in the east Midlands said that an Indian national whose application for asylum in Britain has failed is seeking to avoid deportation on the ground that he would die within days due to lack of proper treatment in India for his kidney condition.
24-year-old Baljit Singh Cheema, is currently on dialysis. He said that sending him to India would effectively be a death sentence. Cheema who receives dialysis at the University Hospital in Walsgrave three times a week, has been ordered by the Home Office to be deported.
Cheema arrived in Britain in January 2005 with a tourist visa but admitted that he wanted to look for work to send money back to his family in India.
He told a local media, "My biggest fear is if I am forced to go back I will die. I won't be able to get treatment and the doctors have told me I'll die without it."
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