27 years lost in legal black hole

Jaipur: No one knows the importance of a passport more than 64-year-old Mohammad Younus.

This man, a resident of Myanmar, strayed into India almost three decades ago. Police arrested him in Bikaner, a district in western Rajasthan.

His crime: He didn't possess a valid passport and visa. Police booked him under India's Foreigners Act.

According to this Act, if any person contravenes the provisions, he shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to five years and shall also be liable for a fine.

Bikaner police arrested Younus in 1980 from the border area of Chhatargarh. During the trial, he was sent to judicial custody and lodged in Bikaner Central Jail.

Mentally unstable

Seven years later, in 1987, he was declared mentally unstable and referred to a government psychiatric ward in Jaipur.

And that was the beginning of a long stay in hospital. Seventeen years, to be precise. During this time, his trial under the Foreigners Act was put on the back burner.

Jaipur doctors declared him medically fit in 2004, and the trial resumed.

A.R. Niyazi, Bikaner Central Jail Superintendent, said Younus was then brought back to the prison even as his trial continued. After fours years of an agonising wait in a jail cell, Younus heard the good news.

Bikaner court ordered his release since he had already spent 27 years in custody (including 17 in hospital) for a crime for which he could have been sentenced to a maximum of five years of imprisonment.

After his release, Bikaner Superintendent of Police Hawa Singh Ghumariya wrote to the Border Security Force (BSF) and also to the Centre for expediting Younus' deportation to Myanmar.

Younus is still waiting for the central government's directives. He is now under the supervision of Jamsar, a police station in Bikaner, and is cooling his heels in Bikaner government hospital.

He does not do anything but lie in his hospital bed. He is in a state of shock and does not speak. No one quite knows what he left back home. Due to prolonged psychiatric treatment, he has become schizophrenic.