KOLKATA: The Calcutta High Court on Wednesday observed that an individual identified as a suspected foreigner has the burden of proving Indian citizenship and that the state has no responsibility in this regard.
Delivering its judgment, the court said voter identity cards, Aadhaar cards and PAN cards are not conclusive proof of Indian citizenship when a person is identified as a suspected foreign national.
Referring to the Immigration and Foreigners Act, 2025, the court said it is for the individual concerned to dispel doubts over his or her citizenship and that neither the court nor the state has any responsibility in this regard.
The observations came while the court was hearing a habeas corpus petition filed by Suman Molla, who claimed that his nephew, Nasir, had been lodged in a detention camp as a suspected Bangladeshi national after his name was deleted from the electoral rolls during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise in West Bengal, despite an appeal against the deletion being pending.
Nasir was detained on June 18 following a circular issued by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs in May 2025.
The court rejected the documents produced by the petitioner, including Nasir's voter identity card, Aadhaar card, PAN card issued by the Income Tax Department and bank passbook, which were relied upon to establish that he was an Indian citizen and not a foreign national.
A division bench of Justices Debangsu Basak and Ajay Kumar Gupta held that these documents do not constitute proof of Indian citizenship.
The bench observed that a voter identity card only establishes that a person was enrolled in the electoral rolls, and noted that Nasir's name had been deleted during the 2026 SIR process.
It also held that merely opening a bank account does not establish Indian citizenship.
"Writ petitioner and the detainee are unable to discharge the burden of proof as mandated by the Immigration and Foreigners Act, 2025," the court observed.
Holding that neither the petitioner nor the detainee had established Nasir's Indian citizenship, the court said it was not inclined to interfere with the authorities' decision and dismissed the habeas corpus petition.
The court noted that, under the Home Ministry's circular, a detainee is given 60 days to establish Indian citizenship. As of the date of the judgment on July 20, Nasir had failed to produce any document establishing his citizenship, it said.
The bench also permitted the petitioner's counsel to speak to Nasir over the phone using a facility provided by the state. During the conversation, Nasir claimed that his parents had died in India.
The court, however, noted that although Nasir claimed his parents had died in India, he was unable to identify where they had been buried.
"We enquired about the parents of the detainee in order to direct DNA testing if the writ petitioner agrees, with the mortal remains of the parents in order to establish that the parents of the detainee were in India," the bench observed. "Since the detainee and the writ petitioner refused to identify the places where the mortal remains of the detainee's parents are lying, we draw an adverse inference as against the detainee with regard to his parents being Indian citizens," the court said.
Taking a dim view of the petitioner, the court observed that Molla had not approached it with clean hands. It noted that while he described himself as Nasir's cousin in a written complaint to the police, he claimed in the writ petition that he was the detainee's uncle.
The petition also stated that after the death of Nasir's father in 1980, Molla had brought up the detainee. The court, however, noted that the petitioner is 38 years old while the detainee is 46 years old.
The bench rejected the petitioner's claim that he had brought up Nasir as his uncle.
Appearing for the Centre, counsel submitted that a detention order issued against Nasir on June 18, 2026, recorded that an inquiry, interrogation and verification of his citizenship had concluded that he was a Bangladeshi national.
(With inputs from PTI)
