NEW DELHI: Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s closest political ally has pledged to rid the capital of “illegal’ immigrants if his party wins looming elections, in a forceful appeal to his party’s Hindu constituency.
Interior minister Amit Shah said every unlawful migrant from neighboring Bangladesh would be expelled from New Delhi “within two years” if his party succeeded in next month’s provincial polls.
“The current state government is giving space to illegal Bangladeshis and Rohingyas,” Shah told an audience of several thousand at Sunday’s rally.
“Change the government and we will rid Delhi of all illegals.”
India shares a porous border stretching thousands of kilometers with Muslim-majority Bangladesh, and illegal migration from its eastern neighbor has been a hot-button political issue for decades.
There are no reliable estimates of the number of Bangladeshis living illegally in Delhi, a city to which millions have flocked in search of employment from elsewhere in India over recent decades.
Critics of Modi and Shah’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accuse the party of using the issue as a dog whistle against Muslims to galvanize its Hindu-nationalist support base during elections.
Delhi, a sprawling megacity home to more than 30 million people, has been governed for most of the past decade by charismatic chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and his Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
Kejriwal rode to power as an anti-corruption crusader a decade ago and his profile has bestowed upon him the mantle of one of the chief rivals to Modi and Shah’s party.
His popularity has been burnished by extensive water and electricity subsidies for the capital’s millions of poorer residents.
But he spent several months behind bars last year on accusations his party took kickbacks in exchange for liquor licenses, along with several fellow party leaders.
Kejriwal denies wrongdoing and characterised the charges as a political witch-hunt by Modi’s government, and despite resigning as chief minister last year vowed to return to the office if his party won re-election.
The BJP has led a spirited campaign in its efforts to dislodge Kejriwal’s party ahead of the February 5 vote.
Modi is expected to make a pilgrimage to the ongoing Kumbh Mela, the biggest festival on the Hindu calendar, to bathe in the sacred Ganges river on the day of the Delhi assembly vote.
Results of the election will be published on February 8.
India minister pledges to evict ‘illegal’ immigrants from capital
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India minister pledges to evict ‘illegal’ immigrants from capital
Philippine city in state of calamity as landfill collapse death toll rises
- 16 people remain missing under piles of waste nearly a week after the incident
- On Monday, the city’s mayor said ‘signs of life’ were still detected under debris
MANILA: Cebu City in the central Philippines has been in a state of calamity since last week’s collapse of a landfill that left at least 20 people dead, authorities said on Wednesday.
A huge mound of garbage at the 15-hectare Binaliw open landfill in Cebu City collapsed suddenly on Jan. 8, burying more than 100 workers and nearby structures underneath.
To release additional funds for emergency response and recovery operations, the Cebu City Council approved on Tuesday a resolution declaring a state of calamity.
After managing to save 18 injured people in the first days of the search, rescuers pulled out the bodies of several victims on Wednesday.
“The number of employees reported missing following the Binaliw landfill incident that occurred on the afternoon of January 8, 2026, has decreased to 16,” the Cebu City Public Information Office stated.
“The reduction in the number of missing individuals follows the recovery of several bodies at the site today, January 14, 2026. With these recoveries, the confirmed death toll has now risen to 20.”
The Cebu City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office said that with the amount of debris, its responders were facing “difficult site conditions,” but remained on the ground to recover all the missing persons.
The hope of finding survivors was reignited by the announcement of Cebu City Mayor Nestor Archival, who said in a press conference on Monday that a team from APEX Mining in Davao brought life-detection equipment that indicated that “there are still signs of life” at the disaster site.
The Cebu City Council announced Friday as a day of mourning for the victims of the Binaliw landslide, which “claimed lives and caused immeasurable grief to the affected families and the community.”
