CUTTACK: The Orissa High Court has declined to hand over a two-year-old girl to her Filipino mother and reposed faith in the care of grandparents, observing that uprooting the child from her settled environment could have a cascading effect on her development.
Emphasising that a child’s welfare goes beyond physical comfort and material advantages, a two-judge bench of Chief Justice Harish Tandon and Justice Chittaranjan Dash, held that the child’s welfare would be better served by continuing her stay with her paternal grandparents in Jajpur district, where she has been living since a few months after birth.
The mother, Nenelle Beronilla Dayandayan, a Philippine citizen working as a kindergarten teacher in Vietnam, approached the High Court on February 18, seeking custody through a habeas corpus petition.
She had alleged that she had been denied access to her daughter since November 2025. The child’s father, Mrutunjaya Kar, an Indian national working as a cyber-security professional in Singapore, is not legally married to her.
Explaining its decision, the bench said the mother’s professional commitments in Vietnam and the absence of anyone to look after the child during her absence were important considerations. It also noted that the woman had children from her first marriage who were living in the Philippines.
The court observed that it would not be conducive to the child’s development to move her to another country when she was an Indian citizen and had an established living arrangement with her grandparents.
“In Indian society, the grandparents also play a very important role in overall development of a child,” the bench observed, adding that the photographs submitted with the petition did not indicate that the child was suffering from any psychological problem and she appeared happy.
However, the court underlined that the mother had an equally valuable right to maintain contact with her daughter. It directed the grandparents to facilitate daily video calls, subject to the child’s routine, comfort and sleeping hours.
The bench further directed that whenever the mother visits India, she must be allowed to spend time exclusively with the child. Before her departure for Vietnam or the Philippines, the child will be returned to the grandparents.
In a significant direction, the court ordered the child’s father to provide the mother with air tickets, accommodation in Odisha and other facilities necessary for her visit to India.
The court refused the custody plea while ensuring that geographical separation would not deprive the mother of her right to maintain a relationship with her daughter.