The Bombay High Court recently while quashing an impugned order of a trial court discharged a man of offences alleging that he hatched a conspiracy for illegally transporting two minor children to USA.

A bench of Justice Bharati Dangre observed, “I do not think that mere cancellation of the return ticket is suspicious circumstance, as it is possible that the passenger might make a request to cancel the ticket of a particular date, but that itself would not amount to an offence, if upon such request, the ticket is cancelled and in fact, the cancellation is by Tabrej, and according to him, it is at the instance of the present Applicant”.

Furthermore, while quashing the impugned order which the Court said that it failed to consider crucial aspects and the man's involvement said, “In absence of any material that the Applicant had knowledge about the conspiracy and of transporting the two children to America by the main accused, I do not think that he can be held responsible for committing an offence under Section 120-B of the IPC, as it is alleged…”.

Advocate Divakar Rai appeared for the applicant and A.P.P. Y.M.Nakhwa appeared for the State-Respondent.

In the present Criminal Revision Application, the applicant contended that there was no material available against him, which could be said to be sufficient to take him for trial in for the offences under Sections 370, 419, 420, 465, 468, 471 read with 120-B of the Indian Penal Code.

The case in the pertinent case was registered on a complaint letter by the Consulate General of the United States of America, where it was narrated that Nirmala Qureshi had applied for U.S. visa at the U.S. Consulate General along with applications for her two children, Sara and Adiv, but as per the police, since the children were below 14 years of age, they were not required to remain present for the interview.

Nirmala also made a reference to U.S. visa in favour of her husband, Azhar, however the database revealed that his visa was already revoked for material misrepresentation. The Consulate General indicated that the two children in fact never travelled to U.S. and the necessary evidence to that effect has been collated, but further revealed that lady by name Nirmala (aka Farida) Qureshi transported one unknown boy and girl to U.S., by making use of the passport of her children and, thereafter, returned alone to India and those two children are illegally residing in U.S. The U.S. Consulate requested BKC police station to invoke the investigation.

Therefore, the accusation is levelled against Nirmala of forging the immigration process and the necessary documents and creating an impression that the children flying with her were her own children, who were allotted visa and that is how misled the Immigration Authorities.

However, the present Applicant’s (accused no. 3) role was limited to booking of tickets and the bench was of the opinion that with the statement of the company owner, who deals with Air ticketing and visa made it clear that he was acquainted with the Applicant, as the Passport Agent and he requested him to book tickets of the passengers, whose details were given to him somewhere in the month of January 2017, for her travel to America along with her two children.

Further that at the instance of the Applicant, Tabrej booked the tickets on two to three occasions and an amount due and payable for the same, was also accepted by him. The details of the tickets booked for the lady and her two children were from Delhi to Frankfurt, from Frankfurt to Orlando as well as another set of ticket from New York to Frankfurt and Frankfurt to Delhi. As per this witness, Zakir intimated him that the return tickets should be cancelled and accordingly, on cancelling the tickets, he prepared a credit note.

Resultantly, the bench after considering the facts and circumstances allowed the Revision Application.

Cause Title: Zakir Yusuf Shaikh v. The State of Maharashtra [Neutral Citation: 2023:BHC-AS:31653]

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Justice Bharati Dangre

Agatha Shukla