The Delhi High Court Monday set aside the government order for removing Ashok Swain’s status as an Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) as no proper reasons were given for the cancellation, reported 24NewsHD TV channel.
An order was passed by the Indian Embassy to Sweden and Latvia to revoke the Sweden-based Indian professor Ashok Swain’s status as an OCI.
Swain is a faculty member of the Peace and Conflict Research Department at the Uppsala University of Sweden.
The court took into notice that the February 8, 2022 order for action against Swain stated that the said exercise of power is under a section of the Citizenship Act on the ground that the petitioner is indulging in activities which is prejudicial to the interest of the sovereignty and integrity of India, security of India and friendly relationship of India with any foreign country.
A single-judge bench observed that other than repeating the above-stated section, no reason has been given in the judgment as to why Ashok Swain’s registration as an OCI cardholder has been revoked. The judge then ordered the responding authorities to pass a detailed order giving the reason for exercising its power under the specified section of the Citizenship Act.
The reason why Swain’s registration was cancelled according to his advocate was an accusation of supposedly being indulged in anti-India writings which are harmful to the interests of India.