The Madras High Court has dismissed a case filed against a decision taken by the State government in November 2019 to deport a Sri Lankan national facing human trafficking charge in India. It has also rejected a plea to permit him to attend an interview at the Embassy of Switzerland in New Delhi for seeking asylum.
Justices P.N. Prakash and R. Pongiappan dismissed a habeas corpus petition filed last year and a writ petition filed this year by Thamarai of Periyar Unarvalargal Kootamaippu in favour of the Sri Lankan national K. Bhaskaran alias Mayuran. The petitioner claimed that the Sri Lankan was facing threat to his life in the island nation.
The litigant had also claimed that the Sri Lankan was a refugee who had fled to India after his family members were killed in the last leg of the war with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). It was insisted that the Sri Lankan should either be allowed to reside in a refugee camp in India or allowed to take asylum in Switzerland.
On the other hand, R. Muniyapparaj, Government Advocate (criminal side), told the court that Mayuran was not a refugee and that he had travelled between Sri Lanka and India quite often. It was brought to the notice of the court that he was involved in the offence of human trafficking in India.
After recording his submissions, the judges said, it was perhaps why Mayuran himself had not chosen to file any petition challenging the deportation order. Wondering if he was even aware of the present petitions filed by a third person, the judges directed the Tiruchi Collector to serve a copy of their dismissal order on him.
The court further refrained from imposing costs on the present petitioner after stating that it does want to be harsh on him.
“The petitioner herein has sworn to an affidavit without disclosing any detail about the cases against Bhaskaran and has merely stated that Bhaskaran is a Sri Lankan refugee. No action can be taken against the petitioner for filing a false affidavit because he would simply wriggle out by saying that he acted on the information collected by him and that he did not know the true facts about Bhaskaran. Thus, we feel that the petitioner is playing truant truant with the legal system to gain unfair advantage by concealing facts,” the Bench observed.
