The High Court has ordered authorities to send 157 foreign nationals who have served their time in prisons across Bangladesh to their home countries.

The bench of Justice Naima Haider and Justice Kazi Zinat Hoque issued the order on Thursday after hearing a writ appeal on the issue.

Advocate Bibhuti Tarafdar presented the petition while Deputy Attorney General Amit Dasgupta was the state counsel.

On Jan 21, the Department of Prisons sent a report to the High Court saying 157 foreign citizens who already completed serving jail sentences for committing different offences were waiting to be deported.

Among them, 150 were Indians, 5 Myanmar nationals, and one each from Pakistan and Nepal. A total of 19 convicts were women, the report said.

Mostly, they were punished in the cases filed under the Control of Entry Act 1952, Passport Act 1952, and the Narcotics Control Act.

Lawyer Bibhuti moved the High Court on Jan 11 on the foreign inmates who already served their terms. The court heard the petition on Jan 15 and asked for a list of the foreign nationals in prison.

According to the writ documents, BGB member Md Rashid Pradhan arrested Govinda Uriya, a resident of India’s Tripura on charges of trespassing on Jan 19, 2022. He filed a case naming Govinda with the Sreemangal Police Station on the same day.

SI Kamrul Hasan submitted the charge sheet against Govinda on Apr 4 of the same year and Moulvibazar Fourth Judicial Magistrate M Mijbah Ur Rahman indicted him. As Govinda pleaded guilty to illegal trespassing, the magistrate handed him 2 months and 10 days of jail.

As the convict already served the jail term, the superintendent of the Moulvibazar Jail was ordered to send him back to India.

But the Indian man was never released even after two years of the court order, according to media reports which lawyer Bibhuti attached to his petition paperwork.