Parliament passes Immigration and Foreigners Bill with RS nod

NEW DELHI, April 2: Parliament approved a bill to regulate immigration, entry and stay of foreigners in India, with the Rajya Sabha giving its nod on Wednesday.
The Immigration and Foreigners Bill, 2025 was passed in Lok Sabha on March 27, 2025. The Rajya Sabha passed the Bill by voice vote on Wednesday after various amendments moved by Opposition members were negated.
Replying to the discussion on the Bill, Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai attacked the pre-vious Congress government and the TMC dispensation in West Bengal for “aiding” illegal immigrants en-ter the country and “facilitating” their stay by including their names in voters’ list and ration cards.
This was strongly objected to by the Congress and TMC members, who along with other opposition parties’ MPs, staged a walkout from the Upper House.
One of the key provisions in the Bill is that anyone found to be using a forged passport or visa for enter-ing India or staying in or exiting from the country will be punishable with a jail term of up to seven years and a fine which could extend to Rs 10 lakh.
The Bill also seeks to ensure a close monitoring of everyone who visits India. The proposed legislation also provides for mandatory reporting of information about foreigners by hotels, universities, other ed-ucational institutions, hospitals and nursing homes to enable tracking of overstaying foreigners.
Rai stated that the Immigration Bureau is already in existence which was questioned by members. The bureau will be the only agency to deal with issues related to immigration and this is the system which is being followed worldwide, he said.
The minister said that all those people are welcomed in the country who come here for education, re-search and development work.
He also stressed that there is a need to deal with all those foreign nationals who are indulged in anti-national activities.
Rai said that the Bill provides for mandatory reporting of information about the admission in hospitals or their place of residence.
“We want people to visit this country and see the development works done by Modi ji and tell that to their countrymen. This Bill also addressed the smooth immigration of diaspora,” he said.
He also clarified that there is no provision of appeal against the order of an immigration officer and few countries have this provision only after the immigrant returns to his country.
The minister said that the Bill was necessary to simplify the legal framework.
On allegations by some members about infiltration in India, he stressed that there have been efforts to curb that as BSF deployment was increased.
Besides, there has been extensive use of technology to curb infiltration, he said.
He alleged that the TMC government has not provided land to the Centre for fencing the international border, and said that infiltration is only happening in those border states where the BJP is not in power.
The minister also alleged that in some states the BSF has been disturbed so that it could not function freely to deal with infiltration.The legislation empowers the central government to exert control over places that are “frequented by any foreigner” and require the owner to close the premises, permit its use under specified conditions, or refuse admission to all or a “specified class” of foreigners. (PTI)