“The illegal immigrants enter the country with the help of fake passports and visas. Sometimes, they enter even without these documents. Most of such immigrants’ entry point into India is Indo-Bangladesh border which is not fenced. Such immigrants enter Karnataka by road. Some illegal immigrants from Sri Lanka take the sea route and come via Tamil Nadu. Later, they find shelter in different parts of the country including Karnataka. Hence, it is difficult to keep track of them,” sources in the State Intelligence Department say.

Such incidents come to light purely by chance whenever the police arrest them in connection with some crime. In fact, detection of illegal immigrants happens just by chance. During the course of interrogation, they spill the beans regarding their nationality. The department feels that there might be some illegal immigrants staying in the state, but their number is not available.

There are two categories of foreigners staying illegally. First, illegal immigrants and second, those overstaying even after expiry of the visa period. The number of foreigners staying in the state has increased enormously over the past few years due to the globalisation process. Students form a majority of the foreigners who stay in the state.  Violation of visa and passport norms take place due to various reasons. Many a time, students who fail to complete an academic course within specified time stay illegally to complete the course. Sometimes, they return to their countries and enter the state with the help of tourist visa to complete the courses, reveal the sources.

Prosecution will be done in cases of violation. If the stay is for hardly 10 to 20 days under the above circumstances, such cases will be treated on humanitarian ground. Such foreigners will be let off by imposing a fine which will be around 30 dollars. However, the amount of the penal fee depends on the circumstances under which norms are violated and on discritionary power of the judges.

In case of overstay which lasts for a year or more the police conduct a detailed inquiry. They collect details regarding places where the foreigners stayed and worked and persons with whom they were closely associated with, say the sources.

They go ‘missing’

The Pakistani nationals enter the country to watch cricket matches through non-reporting visa which does not require any police inquiry. For those entering the country on non-reporting visa, the port of entry and port of exit will be the same. Over a 100 Pakistani nationals who came to watch a India-Pakistan cricket match in Bangalore are said to be “missing.”
Fifteen cases of visa and passport norm violations were reported in 2005 and the number was 16 in 2006 and 26 in 2007. The police try to keep a vigil on overstaying foreigners, but some of them find loopholes in the visa norms and misuse them to meet their agenda, say the police.