JOIN US22 more students deported from US
The deportation of Telugu students from the US continued with 22 more students returning to Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Shamsabad here in the early hours of Sunday.
The students who were detained by the US Customs and Border Protection Agency at the port of entry for more than 20 hours were interviewed by authorities for prolonged hours and were then huddled in return flights to India.
All 22 students were again detained by the RGIA officials who questioned them for another eight hours.
They were allowed to leave for their homes around 11am after the intervention of Telangana state deputy Chief Minister Mohammad Mahmood Ali who was at the airport to catch a flight. Vijayalaxmi, mother of one of the students deported from the US, said her daughter was threatened by the US authorities who reportedly said that they would ban her from entering the US for five years if she refused to return home.
Soumya and Chandana, two other students from Karimnagar and Vijayawada, said that they will never return to that country after the ill treatment meted out.
Yet another student who got admission in Southern Illinois University said that only Telugu students were discriminated against.
“I have seen students from other countries separated from us to form different queues...we were treated like criminals. We were denied to make a phone call even,” Rajesh a native of Visakhapatnam said.