HEMANTA KUMAR BANKA Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This intra court appeal by the writ petitioner is directed against the order dated February 23, 2021 in WPO No. 53 of 2021. The said writ petition was filed by the appellant praying for issuance of writ of a mandamus to direct the authorities namely the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India and UCO Bank to show cause as to why the look-out notice issued against the appellant, impugned in the writ petition, should not be rescinded forthwith. The appellant also sought for a direction upon the respondent to desist and/or forebear from preventing the appellant from travelling abroad. The learned single bench by the impugned order dismissed the writ petition holding that it does not lie in the mouth of the appellant to say that his right to travel touches upon the liberty under Article 21 of the Constitution of India and that Article 21(6) is the sufficient handle to curtail such a right, since the individual right of the appellant has to give way to the public interest of India. Aggrieved by such order, the appellant has preferred the present appeal.

(2.) Mr. Jishnu Chowdhury, learned advocate appearing for the appellant submitted that the learned writ court had principally erred in coming to four wrong conclusions. The first of which being that the court erroneously held that there was sufficient justification for the apprehension of the respondent bank that the appellant might escape from India thereby defeating any effort to recover the huge amounts of loan due from him, which led to the request for issuance of look-out circulars (LOC). The second incorrect finding was that although the orders were passed by the Singapore High Court under the Singaporean law such orders utterly jeopardized financial standings and integrity of the appellant which was sufficient to raise the apprehension that the appellant might not be in a position to repay the loan. Thirdly, it is submitted that the scope and ambit of the office memorandums issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India dtd. 27/10/2010, and dtd. 4/10/2018 have been referred to and relied on without taking into all the relevant clauses in the said office memoranda.

(3.) The learned counsel elaborated his submissions on the aforementioned three contentions. It was submitted that the provisions of the Passports Act, 1967 were not appreciated by the learned single bench as also the rights enshrined to the appellant under Articles 14, 19 and 21 of the Constitution of India. It is submitted that the learned writ court ought not to have relied upon the clause 8(j) of the office memorandum dtd. 27/10/2010 without considering clause 8(h) which provides that no persons can be detained or prevented from leaving the country, if no cognizable offence under Indian Penal Code or other penal laws is pending against such person.