Cuffing deportees 'great shame' for country: Punjab CM Bhagwant Mann

Chandigarh, Feb 6 (PTI) Shackling the deportees sent back to India in a US military aircraft was "a matter of great shame for the country", Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann said on Thursday.

He also slammed the Haryana government for taking the deportees hailing from the state in "police prisoner vans" from the Amritsar airport to their respective hometowns.

A US military aircraft carrying 104 illegal immigrants from various states landed in Amritsar on Wednesday, the first such batch of Indians deported by the Donald Trump administration as part of a crackdown against illegal immigrants.

Of them, 33 each were from Haryana and Gujarat, 30 from Punjab, three each from Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, and two from Chandigarh.

The deportees claimed their hands and legs were cuffed throughout the journey and they were unshackled only after landing at the Amritsar airport.

"We deeply regret what the US did... Sending our citizens back in handcuffs and chains is a matter of great shame for our country," Mann said in a post in Punjabi on X.

"Instead of soothing the wounds of Indians deported from a mentally and economically shattered US, the Haryana government, under Modi ji, took them back in police prisoner vans, which was equivalent to rubbing salt in their wounds," he added.

A C-17 Globemaster aircraft of the US Air Force carrying illegal Indian immigrants landed at the Amritsar airport on Wednesday.

The US action came days before Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Washington to hold wide-ranging talks with Trump.

After completion of all formalities, including immigration, verification and background checks, the deportees were taken to their respective hometowns. PTI