HOUSTON,TX: One Sikh boy being. held by immigration officials in Houston was hospitalized Oct, 9 during the eighth day of his hunger strike.

Manpreet Singh, 24, was hospitalized once last week, then was returned to the immigration detention center,

Meanwhile, efforts were being made in U.S. District Court to block the Immigration and Naturalization Service from kicking the five men out of the country.

US, District Judge David Hittner on Monday refused to issue a temporary restraining order barring the Sikhs’ deportation. But before issuing the ruling, he asked whether it was possible before another hearing might be held on claims they were wrongfully detained. INS Spokeswoman Mariela Melero Cham said the service is still awaiting travel documents from the Indian counsel general before the men could be deported.

The Indian counsel general Swashpawan Singh did not return telephone calls.

“The hospitalized detainee, Manpreet Singh, was 20yearsold when he left his father’s farm in Punjab, India, fearing he would be arrested and tortured by Indian police, he said,

Pane In an interview at the northeast Houston hospital where he was being stated under guard, Singh said he prefers to die here by starving himself rather than be killed in his home country. “ir’s better for me if I die. I did not (Courtesy: Houston Chronicle) ‘commit any crime, but I have been jailed for three years and three months,” Singh said as nurse placed a bowl of broth before him. He left the soup untouched. A group of 35 Sikhs staged a protest last week, calling for the release on bail of five Sikh boys who are engaged in a hunger strike while immigration authorities prepare to deport them.

The five have unsuccessfully sought political asylum, they have not eaten since Oct. 2nd, and would rather die than remain jailed as they have been for the past three years, the protestors said.

 

 

Yet, if they are deported, they face torture or death in India, protesters said,

“They’ve been detained for three years. They should have legal action or give them bond,” said Hardia Mangat, president of the Gurdwara Sahib of Houston.

Mangat said the men’s confinement will be announced at prayer services, and a larger protest will be planned, The men share the surname, Singh, but are not related, Their first names are Kala, Manpreet, Jagden, Manjit and Parwender. At least one of the men, all members of a minority religious group in conflict with the Indian government, said in his asylum application that he left India because he was detained by police and tortured there, said attorney Martha Garza, who represents three of the detainees,

Their asylum claims have been denied, some as long ago as November of 1994, she said, Since they were not expeditiously deported, the men should have been released on bail, Garza said.

Immigration and Naturalization Service spokeswoman Mariela Melero Chami said, however, that all of the men’s judicial avenues have been exhausted with their political asylum requests and appeals denied, ‘They will be deported as soon as proper travel documents are received from India’s counsel general in Houston, she said.

She said the men were not freed on bail during their detention because they were “exclusion” cases rather than deportation cases,

“Exclusion means they were never admitted who the United States and do not have the same access to bond,” Melero Chami said.

The men were arrested in s cases when they flew into U.S. air ports without proper documents, Melera Chami said, not have a say so in exclusion cases,” she said.

The men are weak but have been given liquids and a nutritional drink to keep them healthy, she said

In fiscal year 1993, the last year that final figures are available, 7551 Indian applications were pending, Only 357 were granted, and 985 were denied, said Russ Bergeron, an INS spokesman in Washington.

Article extracted from this publication >>  October 13, 1995