Stolen Dreams: The targeted arrest and deportation of Rohingya students in India
- Ahtaram Shin
- Dec 16, 2025
- 6 min read
By Ahtaram Shin
For Mohammed Nur, a young Rohingya student, May 2025 was meant to be a time of study and ambition. Instead, it became a timeline of trauma. He shares a harrowing eyewitness account of the detention and subsequent deportation of his fellow students whose only crime was seeking an education.
“My brother, Mohammed Toyub, and other students did not commit any crimes. They didn't violate Indian laws. They were arrested only because they are Rohingya,” says Mohammed Nur.
Nur emphasizes a stark double standard in how refugees are treated in India. While students from Afghanistan, Somalia, and Iraq live and study in the country with relative safety, the crackdown has focused ferociously on the Rohingya.
“They did not arrest other nationalities,” Nur explains, his voice heavy with the memory. “The Indian authorities systematically targeted us.”
Mohammed Nur’s journey began long before the arrests. He fled to Bangladesh in 2017 at the age of 12, escaping the genocide in Myanmar. By 2022, he had completed Grade 10 in a community-led high school in the refugee camps. But for Rohingya youth in Bangladesh, education often hits a dead end after secondary school. Nur explained he and his colleagues paid traffickers to flee the camps and reach India because they didn't have the right to pursue higher education in Bangladesh.
“There are many youths like me, such as Mohammed Raiz, Nur Hussain, and many others, who went to India in 2022. I was also living with them in the same room, studying in the same class and at the same institution,” Nur said.
In New Delhi, they found a brief glimmer of hope. Possessing UNHCR refugee cards and registered with the government, the students gained admission to senior secondary education under the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) in Vikas Puri, New Delhi. They were not hiding in the shadows; they were registered, documented, and eager to learn.
“There were over 50 of us,” Nur recalls. “Mohammed Raiz, Nur Hussain, and many others. We lived together, studied in the same classes, and shared the same struggles, language barriers, financial hardship, and cultural isolation. But we had patience.”
The students believed their UNHCR documents protected them. However, on May 6, 2025, that trust was shattered. Authorities summoned Rohingya immigrants for what was termed a “re-verification” exercise. It was a trap.
“The students went to the police station believing it was routine. Many were detained immediately,” Nur recounts. “I only escaped because some of us were visiting Kashmir or couldn't make it to the station that day.”
Police reportedly used mobile phone tracking to hunt down those who didn't appear. In the sweep, approximately 25 students were arrested. Another 25 managed to flee, discarding their SIM cards and vanishing into the city or attempting the dangerous journey back to Bangladesh.
“Some of us were visiting Kashmir, and others were unable to present themselves at the police station. Because of this, some of my friends and I escaped detention,” Nur told.
After being held in detention for two days, at least 40 Rohingya refugees, including women and children, were deported toward Myanmar’s Tanintharyi Region. However, this was not a standard handover. Reports indicate that the Indian vessel forced the refugees into the open sea, leaving them to be rescued by local fishermen. They were subsequently taken in by the People’s Defence Forces (PDF). Among those deported were approximately 15 students, while around 10 of their peers remain in Indian detention centers.
Human rights organisations have documented similar abuses. According to a report by Human Rights Watch, Indian authorities have placed around 40 Rohingya refugees on a ship near the Myanmar coast and forced them to swim ashore. An estimated 40,000 Rohingya live in India, at least 20,000 of whom are registered with the UN refugee agency. Although India is not a party to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention or its 1967 Protocol, it is bound by the customary international law principle of non-refoulement, which prohibits returning people to places where they face serious threats to their lives or freedom.
“My brother, Mohammed Toyub, and his friends Mohammed Raiz, Nur Hussain, Mohammed Toha, and many others were neither deported nor released. I used to speak with them in the Indian detention center before, but now I cannot contact them. I do not know their whereabouts,” Nur said.
According to Nur, his brother and remaining friends are currently held at the Inderlok Detention Center in New Delhi, a facility often used as a transit point before deportation. There are also four other Rohingya detainees at the same centre who were arbitrarily detained by Indian authorities as far back as 2021.
Reports further indicate that Indian authorities have deported more than 200 Rohingya refugees to Bangladesh and Myanmar since May 2025, while hundreds more remain arbitrarily detained. These forced returns place Rohingya refugees at grave risk of torture, persecution, and death, and constitute serious violations of international legal obligations.
Nur further alleged that the Indian authorities, particularly under the Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, have fabricated false accusations against Rohingya people, including claims that they were involved in an attack in Pahalgam. These allegations have been widely used to justify arrests and deportations.
“We used to speak with my brother Toyub through the security guards’ phone at the Inderlok detention center, and we sent money to support him. Now those phones are no longer available,” Nur explained.
In a desperate attempt to release friends and relatives, Nur and others spent large sums of money trying to bring deported Rohingya back from Myanmar, but these efforts failed.
“According to my understanding, those who were deported in Myanmar are not in detention. They told us that for the last four months they have been near Thailand, in Tanintharyi District in Myanmar,” he said.
Since October, families have been unable to communicate with the detained or deported students. There is no reliable information about their condition or even whether they are alive.
“When we last spoke, they told us there was intense fighting. For the last four months, we have not been able to contact them at all,” Nur added.
Among those deported to Myanmar, one student, two women and another man were eventually released after their relatives paid money to the PDF. These four Rohingya individuals are now living in Yangon with relatives. However, there is still no information about the fate of the others according the resources.
Relatives of the detainees report ongoing armed clashes between the PDF and the Myanmar Military Junta. Due to frequent fighting, people are often forced to evacuate from one place to another. According to Nur, the only possible escape route is to Thailand, which again requires paying large sums of money to the people they are with if the fighting subsides.
While some Christian deportees reportedly receive assistance from the PDF or other groups in Myanmar, Muslim Rohingya receive no such support and are still required to pay money to survive or move to safer areas, added by Nur.
UN Special Rapporteur Tom Andrews stated that such incidents demonstrate a “blatant disregard for the lives and safety of those who require international protection.” Human Rights Watch and Fortify Rights have documented evidence of Indian authorities beating Rohingya refugees, denying them due process, and arbitrarily detaining hundreds for prolonged periods in places including New Delhi, Jammu, Manipur, and Assam.
Ultimately, complex geopolitical analysis matters less than the deafening silence on the other end of the phone line. Nur’s brother and his friends sought only education; instead, they found themselves trapped in a web of detention, deportation, and disappearance. As international outcry fades and regional focus blurs, these students are slipping into the cracks between Indian detention centres and Myanmar’s conflict zones. They are vanishing into the shadows, without a sound.
References and further reading:
Human Rights Watch: "India: Scores of Rohingya Refugees Expelled" (August 28, 2025).
Fortify Rights: "India: End Unlawful Expulsion of Indian Muslim Citizens and Rohingya Refugees" (July 31, 2025).
Supreme Court Observer: "Lifting the Veil" (December 15, 2025).
ReliefWeb: "A Lifetime in Detention: Rohingya Refugees in India" (December 2024).
