Senior Congress leader V. Hanumantha Rao knocked doors of the Telangana High Court seeking a direction to the Central government to issue him his passport.
Mr. Rao filed a writ petition saying that denial of passport to him by the Union of India and the Regional Passport Officer, Secunderabad, be declared as arbitrary and illegal. In his petition, he had said that a Chennai-based club has invited him to Kuala Lumpur to participate in the inauguration of an international cricket tourney.
He stated that the Centre had issued him a diplomatic passport when he was a Member of Parliament. On completion of the term three years ago, he surrendered the diplomatic passport to the Secunderabad RPO. He submitted an application to the officer requesting him to issue his regular passport.
Mr. Rao said that his application for regular passport was not considered by the authorities as the Saifabad police registered a case against him on March 24, 2017, for staging a demonstration at the Assembly as part of a call given by his party. The police invoked three sections of the Indian Penal Code against him accusing him of obstructing police officers from discharging their duties.
Mr. Rao stated that registration of a crime or issuing a First Information Report against a person cannot be a ground to deny passport to that person. Police didn’t file a chargesheet also in that case, he said.
The senior leader stated that earlier he and other parties related to a criminal case registered against them in 2007 arrived at an understanding and both filed a petition in the court seeking to compound the offence in 2017. The magistrate referred the case to Lok Adalat which acquitted the petitioner of the charge.