India has extended the visa of deposed prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who has been in the country since last August, the Hindustan Times reports, citing people familiar with the matter.
The move came against the backdrop of growing calls in Bangladesh for her extradition, according to the report published on Wednesday.
Hasina, 77, fled to India after stepping down in the face of a nationwide mass movement. She has been incommunicado since she arrived at Hindon airbase on Aug 5, though it is learnt that she has been moved to a safe house in Delhi.
The HT report noted that the Muhammad Yunus-led interim government sought her extradition through a note verbale, or unsigned diplomatic correspondence, sent to the Indian external affairs ministry on Dec 23.
Hasina's visa was recently extended to facilitate her stay in the country, sources familiar with the situation said on condition of anonymity. They dismissed speculation about Hasina being granted asylum in the country by pointing out that India doesn't have a specific law for dealing with refugees and matters such as asylum.
The move to extend the visa involved the home ministry, which has to sign off on such matters, and was done through the local Foreigners Regional Registration Office, or FRRO, the sources said without providing details.
On Jan 3, the HT reported that the Indian government is unlikely to respond to Bangladesh's request to extradite Hasina, with people familiar with developments saying that Dhaka hasn't completed key formalities necessary to take forward such an issue.
On Tuesday evening, a government official in Dhaka announced the Department of Immigration and Passports' decision to revoke the passports of 97 people, including Hasina, for their alleged involvement in enforced disappearances and killings during the July uprising.
"The passports department cancelled passports of 22 people involved in enforced disappearances, while passports of 75 people, including Sheikh Hasina, were revoked due to their involvement in the July killings," the chief advisor's Deputy Press Secretary Abul Kalam Azad Majumder said.
The latest developments come at a time when the International Criminal Tribunal, or ICT, set up to prosecute persons accused of genocide and crimes against humanity, issued a second arrest warrant for Hasina on Jan 6.
The India external affairs ministry, which has acknowledged the receipt of Bangladesh's extradition but declined to comment on the matter, has also said in the past that it is up to Hasina to decide her future plans.
"As far as former prime minister Sheikh Hasina is concerned, we don't have an update on her plans. It is for her to take things forward," ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal told a media briefing last year.
—bdnews24.com
