It's an interesting situation. We already have an agreement with India that their illegal entrants will be handed over to their consul. This is perhaps an extension of that situation with some detail to work out.
Because they were intercepted outside of our territorial waters and flown to Australia by Australia they probably haven't entered illegally.
Maybe after processing most will be flown back to India with some left in limbo depending what happens in the high court or maybe if India doesn't take them all the others will go to offshore detention.
Labor's argument is why didn't they take them straight to Christmas Island and process them there using existing agreements with India and Sri Lanka for return instead of taking them on a cruise for a few weeks.
Perhaps the answer to that is political considerations rather than operational considerations.
