NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court upheld a family court’s interim order granting custody of a four-year-old girl to her Indian father, citing a reasonable apprehension that the child’s Russian mother might leave India.
A Division Bench of Justices Anil Kshetrapal and Harish Vaidyanathan Shankar dismissed the mother’s challenge to protect the court’s jurisdiction.
“The various concerns and considerations that need to be given primacy would only come into play once the legal system were permitted its free play, an important facet of which, would be the ability to have its decisions enforced/ implemented. If this basic foundational feature were to be absent, the entire exercise would be rendered futile,” the Court said.
The judges noted both mother and child hold Russian passports and that the mother had earlier sought exit permits with assistance from the Russian Embassy.
“There exists more than a reasonable apprehension that the appellant may remove herself and the child from the jurisdiction of Indian courts,” the Bench observed.
The Bench also referred to a Supreme Court matter where a Russian national allegedly departed India with her child while litigation was pending, frustrating enforcement even after shared custody was ordered.
“In the said case, despite the Hon’ble Court having granted shared custody, the proceedings presently stand frustrated as, inter alia, and as apparently observed by the Hon’ble Supreme Court, due to negligence of the concerned authorities, the child was ‘snatched’ from the jurisdiction of the Court. The said case has received considerable media attention and, despite the Indian Government’s repeated and concerted efforts, remains wrapped in diplomatic red tape.”