Delhi HC notice to Centre in Nitasha Kaul’s petition against blacklisting her

THe new delhi heights margaret court on midweek issued note in Indian-origin professor Nitasha Kaul’s petition challenging the Centre’s decision to blacklist her from entering India and cancelling her Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) status.The Centre on March 6 had revoked her OCI card citing anti national activities.A bench of justice Sachin Datta sought Centre’s response on her petition and also on her interim relief to stay the March 6 decision and permit her to come to India for three weeks to meet her ailing mother .The matter would be next heard on January 28.In her petition, Kaul has asserted that the March 6 OCI Cancellation Order as well as the undisclosed Purported Blacklisting Order are devoid of any legal or factual foundation, having been issued without providing her the material that allegedly formed the basis for these decisions.Such decisions, the petition went on to add, are violative of her fundamental right to equality, personal liberty, provisions of the Citizenship Act, 1955, as well as the Foreigners Act, 1946 which provide for a reasonable opportunity of being heard to the cardholder concerned before taking a call on cancellation.“The Impugned OCI Cancellation Order dated 06.03.2025 and the Purported Blacklisting Order is in the teeth of the Principles of Natural Justice, the Petitioner’s constitutional rights guaranteed under Articles 14 and 21 of the Indian Constitution, and statutory rights conferred under Section 7 of the Citizenship Act, 1955, as well as the Foreigners Act, 1946, which encompasses within its ambit the rights to procedural fairness, transparency, and proportionality,” the petition stated.It went on to add that Centre’s ground to cancel her OCI citing anti-India activities is mechanical, makes general assertions regarding her alleged journalistic and scholarly activities and is devoid of concrete evidence or intelligible particulars, which lead to the inferences of alleged “anti-India activities”.“It is submitted that the Impugned OCI Cancellation Order is a non-speaking order, passed without any application of mind and without considering the Petitioner’s detailed Reply dated 10.05.2024 to the Show Cause Notice,” it added.The petition further stated that the purported blacklisting order which formed the basis of her deportation in February 2024 was issued at the time when her OCI card was valid and the same was also taken without issuance of a show cause notice.”