Delhi HC directs Centre to issue passport to Manipur couple exiled for 23 years
The Delhi High Court on Wednesday allowed a couple, who was exiled for 23 years, to return home.
In an order, dated August 28, a bench comprising Gita Mittal, the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court, and Justice C Hari Shankar, directed the centre to issue a valid passport to the couple.
The couple, Luingam Luithui and his wife, both residents of Manipur were on holiday in Bangkok in 1994 when the wife’s passport was stolen. They then approached the Indian Embassy for a duplicate, but were denied one.
According to the government, the couple was denied a passport by the Indian Embassy in Thailand because they allegedly had links with leaders of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland, which has, under the Unlawful Prevention Act 1967, been identified as an unlawful organisation.
Both Luingam and his wife have refuted the allegations and said that they were harassed by the Thai police.
The couple then approached the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, which then sent them to Canada.
However, even in Canada, the Indian Embassy allegedly impounded Luingam’s passport without prior justification.
Terming the harassment of the couple as the ‘worst kind of deprivation possible’, the Delhi High Court observed that the passport authorities should …read more