AMRITSAR, India (Diya TV) — A US military aircraft carrying 104 Indian nationals deported for entering the country illegally landed in Punjab on Wednesday, marking the latest effort by the Trump administration to enforce its immigration policies.
The C-17 transport plane left from Texas late on Tuesday and arrived in Amritsar, where authorities set up special counters to process the deportees. Punjab’s Minister for Non-Resident Indian Affairs, Kuldeep Singh Dhaliwal, said that 33 of the deportees were from Gujarat, 33 from Haryana, and 30 from Punjab. Others came from Uttar Pradesh and Chandigarh.
Police had escorted the deportees out of the airport in small groups, and local officials said they would be treated “friendly” before being sent to their home states.
President Trump has made mass deportations of undocumented immigrants a priority, and the U.S. government has identified about 18,000 Indian nationals whom it believes entered the country illegally. Deportation flights to India are not new; over 1,000 Indian nationals were repatriated in the last U.S. fiscal year, but this is the first time a military aircraft has been used for such a mission to India.
Recently, the United States State Department held discussions with Indian officials regarding illegal migration. Secretary of State Marco Rubio met India’s Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar last month. He reaffirmed that Washington was committed to discussing “concerns related to irregular migration.”
India’s foreign ministry announced that it will accept deportees, once details are verified. Officials in New Delhi are also working with Washington to promote legal pathways for migration, especially for skilled workers.
