The Bombay High Court has recently directed the Passport Authority of India, not to withhold the renewal of actor and rape convict Shiney Ahuja’s passport on grounds of his pending appeal in High Court.
A single-judge Justice Amit Borkar noted, “Considering the fact that during the pendency of the present appeal, the passport was renewed on more than six occasions and there is no violation of bail conditions, the applicant has made a case for a direction to the passport authority to renew the applicant’s passport, provided he is otherwise liable for the renewal of the passport for ten years.”
Back in March 30, 2011, a sessions court in Mumbai had convicted and sentenced Shiney Ahuja to seven years of imprisonment for the rape of his house help, an offense under section 376 of the IPC.
Challenging his conviction and sentence, Ahuja lodged an appeal before the Bombay High Court, which granted him bail on April 27, 2011. Among the conditions for his bail was a restriction on leaving the country without the explicit permission of the court.
He was eventually permitted to travel abroad on December 5, 2011, after submitting a comprehensive itinerary of his intended destinations. The court consequently ordered the return of his passport.
Ahuja, through his advocate Karamsingh B. Rajput, stated that he had approached the Embassy of India in the Philippines for the renewal of his passport. However, they demanded a court order as a requisite document for renewal, and additionally requested the court order to specify the duration of validity; otherwise, renewal would be granted only for a year.
The plea emphasized that renewing the passport for just a year was causing undue hardship, as some countries did not allow visitors with passports valid for less than six months to stay in their territory.
As a result, the bench disposed of the interim application and passed the following order: “The applicant’s request for a renewal of the passport for a period of ten years shall not be declined on account of the pending appeal, provided the applicant is otherwise eligible for the renewal of the passport.”
