New Delhi: In Assam, a 44-year-old Muslim widow was declared a foreigner despite her parents and siblings being Indian citizens. She has now moved the Supreme Court against the Gauhati High Court for refusing to hear her petition after she belatedly approached it against a Foreigners’ Tribunal order that held her “non-Indian”.
On 12 September 2019, the Foreigners’ Tribunal in Assam declared Aheda Khatun a foreigner on the premise that she had failed to establish a link between her Indian parents and grandparents. In doing so, it did not consider what Khatun calls in her current plea “authoritative documents”, including four consecutive voter lists that listed her parents as voters, her school certificate, the Gaonburah certificate issued by the head of her village, and a registered gift deed of land given to her by her father.
Aheda Khatun was held in a detention camp till the Gauhati HC refused to interfere in her matter, citing her failure to “explain the delay” in approaching the court, but not on the merits of her case. Khatun had approached the Gauhati HC six years after the tribunal order, requesting the court to re-examine her case, including her documents, and then adjudicate the case. However, after the Gauhati HC’s August 2025 dismissal of her plea, the authorities pushed her into Bangladesh, where she has been since.
Before the Supreme Court, Aheda Khatun has not only sought the reversal of the Gauhati HC order, but also questioned the tribunal’s order on its merits. The HC’s refusal to at least examine the documents and check into the merits of her plea has affected her life and personal liberty, her plea claims.
The case
On Monday, a bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymala Bagchi issued a notice to the Assam government. It came after Khatun’s brother, a civil police officer in his village, filed an affidavit, affirming that the documents the family was relying on to prove her citizenship are genuine.
Aheda Khatun’s current petition claims she was born in Nagaon district of Assam in July 1981. Her parents’ names appeared continuously in the electoral rolls of 1965, 1970, 1985, and 1997. In 1987, her father inherited ancestral land and gifted portions of it to his daughters, including her, via a registered gift deed in June 2010. In the same year, her husband passed away.
Proceedings against Khatun began with a police reference made in 1998. That reference was hinged on the Electoral Registration Officer, without any notice to Khatun or her involvement in any way, her petition alleges. The reference culminated in a case before the Foreigners’ Tribunal in 2017. On 12 September 2019, the tribunal labelled her ‘non-Indian’.
Aheda Khatun’s lawyer, senior advocate C.U. Singh, told ThePrint that Khatun submitted nine documents and duly proved them through the testimony of various witnesses, such as the headmaster of the madrassa where she and her brother studied.
“However, the tribunal rejected the evidence, particularly the Gaonburah certificate, because it bore a State Emblem. This is a long-recognised rural practice. But the tribunal saw it as a fake document, despite the person who had issued it appearing and confirming he prepared the paper,” Singh said.
Instead of rectifying these patent errors, the high court disposed of Khatun’s petition, solely on the issue of “delay”, imputing falsity to her, Singh explained.
The petition raises substantial questions for the court’s consideration, with one relating to the evidentiary value of certified public documents and whether documents can be rejected on technical grounds, such as the use of the State Emblem.
It also discusses the constitutional obligation of high courts to assess perversity in the tribunal’s order, even where delay is alleged, particularly in a matter where someone’s life and liberty are at stake.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)