Discuss the demographic and security related dangers created in India by illegal immigrants. What legislative and administrative measures have been taken so far to address the issue?

India’s open and porous borders have been exploited by illegal migrants to influx into the territories of India. This is posing great socio-economic and political challenges. Demographic challenges

• The influx of the refugees often alters the demographic composition in terms of ethnicity, language, religion, culture etc. This gives to differentiation as WE and THEM leading to communal and ethnic tensions. As a result peace and stability will be severely challenged. The North east is adversly affected due to the demographic changes brought out by the illegal immigration. The most affected is the state of Assam. Assam is facing serious challenges of the communal tensions due to the demographic changes brought out by the illegal immigration.
• India being resource deficit is struggling to cater effectively to build the social and physical infrastructure. The increased pressure due to illegal immigration further exerts pressure on resources. This pressure on resources adversely affects the quality of the human resource. The poor quality of the human resource may result in demographic disaster for India.

Security challenges

• Terrorism: The illegal immigrants are often acting as a catalyst to give impetus to the terrorist activities in the country.
• Communal violence: The illegal migration is often igniting communal tensions threatening peace and stability in the country.
• Fundamentalism: The illegal immigrants are often used as tools to propagate religious fundamentalism and radicalism.

Steps taken to address the issue of illegal immigrants

• Amendments to citizenship act which bars the children of illegal immigrants from acquiring Indian citizenship based on birth.
• The illegal immigrants act has been struck down by SC.
• National population register for Assam is being developed to aid in identification of illegal immigrants.
• Implementation of Madhukar Gupta committee report to fill the loopholes in border management.
• Land swap agreement with Bangladesh to close down the avenues of the illegal immigration.

The illegal immigration needs to be addressed with combination of domestic and international measures. The Indian diplomats need to secure the effective cooperation of our neighbours to deal with the problem of illegal immigrants effectively.