Prime Minister Narendra Modi Thursday said at a press conference with President Trump that both leaders are on the same page when it comes to illegal immigration.
“Anybody who enters another country illegally, they have absolutely no right to be in that country,” said Mr. Modi.
“And as far as India and the U.S. is concerned,” he said, “we have always been of the same opinion, and that is that any verified Indian who is in the U.S. illegally, we are fully prepared to take them back to India.”
Mr. Modi said that often, though, many children of ordinary families are “lured by big dreams and big promises” by bad actors and are brought to countries without knowing the reason, and then find themselves caught up in the human trafficking system.
“We have to make sure that we fight against this system. As far as the U.S. and India is concerned, I think what we should do is make efforts to make sure that we uproot this from within the system,” he said.
Mr. Modi said he believes that by removing human trafficking, India’s young, vulnerable, poor people will be less likely to be fooled into going to other countries illegally through criminal organizations that take advantage of their circumstances.
A U.S. military plane carrying 104 deported Indian migrants arrived in a northern Indian city last week. The Indians who returned home had illegally entered the U.S. over the years and came from various Indian states.
India has cooperated with the U.S. and accepted the deported Indians following verification.
According to a Pew Research Center report as of 2022, India ranked third, after Mexico and El Salvador, on the list of country with the largest number of unauthorized immigrants — 725,000 — living in the U.S.
Recent years have also seen a jump in the number of Indians attempting to enter the country along the U.S.-Canada border.
The U.S. Border Patrol arrested more than 14,000 Indians on the Canadian border in the year ending Sept. 30, which amounted to 60% of all arrests along that border and more than 10 times the number two years ago.
— This article is based in part on wire service reports.
• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.