Chandigarh, June 2
In a ground-breaking judgment, the Punjab and Haryana High
Court has refused the plea of a Malaysian citizen for grant of custody of his two children, whom, he had alleged, his wife had “illegally brought to India”.
Turning down the prayer, the Bench headed by Mr Justice Virender Singh ruled that the petitioner was not eligible for any relief from the court as he had concealed important information from the Malaysian court, which had granted a decree in his favour.
The petitioner — Ranbir Singh, a Malaysian citizen — had initially filed a habeas corpus before the Vacation Bench of the High Court last year, praying that his two
children be got released from the alleged illegal confinement of his wife.
He had claimed that the two children, born out of wedlock, had been forcibly and clandestinely brought to India by his wife, Satinder Kaur Mann, in February, 2004.
The children — Haralekh Singh (6) and Mehak Kaur Khosa (4) — are in the custody of his wife. He had alleged that Ms Mann, without informing him or her employers, came to India along with the two children, following which he
filed a case in the High Court of Malaya (Malaysia). The Malaysian court ordered that he was entitled to the legal guardianship of the two children. However, by then his
wife had managed to bring the children to India.
Saying that his children were Malaysian citizens and should be handed over to him, Mr Ranbir Singh had also claimed that his wife took away with her jewellery and cash from the house while fleeing.
Incidentally, the petitioner’s
father originally hails from a village near Ferozepore, while he was born and brought up in Malaysia. He
had claimed that his wife was residing in Punjab along with the two children.
He had also alleged that his wife managed to illegally procure visas for the two children as Malaysian law clearly says that only the father can apply for visas for his children.
However, the counsel for Ms Mann had questioned the veracity of the claims made by the petitioner. Her counsel had informed the court that since the Malaysian court had been misled and provided wrong information, the decree granted by it could not be applicable here.
Agreeing with Ms Mann’s counsel, Mr Justice Virender Singh held that the case fell in the category of exemptions to Section 13 of the Hindu Marriage Act and, hence, the custody of the children could not be granted to the petitioner on the basis of a fraudulently-obtained decree. The court also observed that the children were happily staying with their mother and it was in their interest if the status quo continued.
Decrees obtained from foreign courts obtained through questionable means, the Bench held,
could not be held to be binding on Indians.
However, the court gave liberty to the petitioner to pursue other legal options to obtain custody of his children.
