JASWANT SINGH v. TORTURE CLAIMS APPEAL BOARD [Decision on Leave Application]

HCAL 858/2020 [2023] HKCFI 2362 IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST NO. 858 OF 2020 BETWEEN Jaswant Singh Applicant and Torture Claims Appeal Board and Putative Respondent Director of Immigration Putative Interested Party Application for Leave to Apply for Judicial Review NOTIFICATION of the Judge’s decision (Ord. 53 r. 3) Following: consideration of the documents only; or consideration of the documents and oral submissions by the Applicant in open court / the Applicant being absent in open court; Order by Deputy High Court Judge Bruno Chan: The application for leave to apply for judicial review be dismissed. Observations for the Applicant: The Applicant is a 42-year-old national of India who arrived in Hong Kong on 16 April 2015 as a visitor with permission to remain as such up to 30 April 2015 when he did not depart and instead overstayed, and on 4 May 2015 he surrendered to the Immigration Department and raised a non-refoulement claim on the basis that if he returned to India he would be harmed or killed by certain local supporters of the political party Shiromani Akali Dal (“SAD”) as he supported their rival Indian National Congress (“INC”). He was subsequently released on recognizance pending the determination of his claim. The Applicant was born and raised in Village Haraj, District Ferozpur, Punjab, India. After leaving school he worked as a driver, got married and raised a family with 3 children in his home village, and supported INC regularly attended their local activities but without holding any official post in the party. During the election for their village head in 2014, the Applicant together with his fellow INC supporters attended at the election booth to vote for their INC candidate, but were confronted by some SAD supporters which led to a mass brawl between the 2 groups during which the Applicant struck and injured one of the SAD supporters with a wooden rod before making his escape back to his home unharmed. However, later when he heard that those SAD supporters were looking for him for revenge, the Applicant went into hiding, and on 13 April 2015 he departed India for Hong Kong where he subsequently overstayed and raised his non-refoulement claim for protection, for which he completed a Non-refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 15 January 2018 and attended screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation. By a Notice of Decision dated 8 March 2018 the Director of Immigration (“Director”) rejected the Applicant’s claim on all the applicable grounds including risk of torture under Part VIIC of the Immigration Ordinance, Cap. 115 (“Torture Risk”), risk of his absolute or non-derogable rights under the Hong Kong Bill of Rights Ordinance, Cap. 383 (“HKBOR”) being violated including right to life under Article 2 (“BOR 2 Risk”), risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment under Article 3 of HKBOR (“BOR 3 Risk”), and risk of persecution with reference to the non-refoulement principle under Article 33 of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (“Persecution Risk”). In his decision the Director took into account of all the relevant circumstances of the Applicant’s claim and found no substantial grounds for believing that there will be any real and substantial risk of him being harmed or killed by those local SAD supporters upon his return to India due to the absence of or low intensity and frequency of past ill-treatment from them, that there is no evidence or reason for them to specifically target him for harm or to have any adverse interest in him given that he was just an ordinary INC supporter without holding any official post in the party, that in any event in the absence of any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant if resorted to, and that reliable and objective Country of Origin Information (“COI”) show that reasonable internal relocation alternatives are available in India with a large population of 1.2 billion people spread across a vast territory of more than 3.2 million square kilometers that it would not be unduly harsh for the Applicant as an able-bodied adult with working experience to move to other areas of the country away from his home district in large cities such as Delhi or Mumbai where it would be difficult if not impossible for anyone to locate him. The Applicant then lodged an appeal to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the Director’s decision, and for which he attended an oral hearing on 3 December 2019 before the Board during which he gave evidence and answered questions raised of his claim by the Adjudicator for the Board. On 8 April 2020 his appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the Director’s decision. In its decision the Board found inconsistencies and discrepancies in the Applicant’s evidence that it doubted his claim of fear of harm from those local SAD supporters that caused him to leave India to come to Hong Kong to seek protection, and that in any event there was no evidence or reason for the SAD people to have any adverse interest in him given that he was just an ordinary INC supporter without holding any official post in the party, and that in the absence of any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant upon his return to India as well as reasonable internal relocation for him to move safely to other part of the country away from his home district without any risk of being located that his claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds. On 11 May 2020 the Applicant filed his Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of the Board’s decision, but no ground for seeking relief was given in his Form or in his supporting affirmation of the same date to which he just attached a copy of the decision but without putting forth any proper ground for his intended challenge, nor did he request any oral hearing for his application. As such and in the absence of any error of law or irrationality or procedural unfairness in his process before the Board or in its decision being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, I do not find any reasonably arguable basis for his intended challenge. As has been repeatedly emphasized by the Court of Appeal, judicial review does not operate as a rehearing of a non-refoulement claim when the proper occasion for the Applicant to present and articulate his claim is in the screening process and interview before the Immigration Department and in the process before the Board where the evaluation of the risk of harm is primarily a matter for the Director and the Board as they are entitled to make such evaluation based on the evidence available to them that the court will not usurp their role as primary decision makers in the absence of any legal error or procedural unfairness or irrationality in their decisions being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, as judicial review is not an avenue for revisiting the assessment by them in the hope that the court may consider the matter afresh: Re Lakhwinder Singh [2018] HKCA 246; Re Daljit Singh [2018] HKCA 328; Re Mudannayakalage Chaminda Pushpa Kumara [2018] HKCA 400; and Nupur Mst v Director of Immigration [2018] HKCA 524. In the Applicant’s case, the fact is that it has been established by both the Director and the Board in their respective decision that the risk of harm in the Applicant’s claim if real is a localized one and that it is not unreasonable or unsafe for him to relocate to other part of India, there is simply no justification to afford him with non-refoulement protection in Hong Kong: see TK v Jenkins & Anor [2013] 1 HKC 526. Having considered the decisions of both the Director and the Board with rigorous examination and anxious scrutiny, I do not find any error of law or procedural unfairness in either of them, nor any failure on their part to apply high standards of fairness in their consideration and assessment of the Applicant’s claim. Moreover, the Applicant has recently filed an affirmation requesting to withdraw his application as he wants to return to his home country as soon as possible. In the premises, as I am for the given reasons not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, and in view of his latest confirmation of his wish to return to his home country as soon as possible, I accordingly dismiss his leave application. Dated the 19th day of September 2023 (Chung Lai Fan, Christine) for Registrar, High Court Where leave to apply has been granted, Applicants and their legal advisers are reminded of their obligation to reconsider the merits of their application in the light of the Respondent’s evidence Notes for the Applicant: If leave has been granted, the Applicant or the Applicant’s solicitors must: a) serve on the respondent and such interested parties as may be directed by the Court the order granting leave and any directions given within 14 days after the leave was granted (Order 53, rule 4A); b) issue the originating summons within 14 days after the grant of leave and serve it in accordance with Order 53, rule 5; and c) supply to every other party copies of every affidavit which the Applicant proposes to use at the hearing, including the affidavit in support of the application for leave (Order 53, rule 6(5)). Sent to the Applicant on 19 September 2023 Jaswant Singh Applicant’s ref. no.: Nil. Sent to the Putative Respondent / the Putative Respondent’s solicitors / such Putative Interested Parties as may be directed by the Court / the Putative Interested Parties’ solicitors on 19 September 2023 Torture Claims Appeal Board Putative Respondent’s ref. no.: USM 10873/18/3/325/IN2089 Director of Immigration Putative Interested Party’s ref. no.: QA T/C 568/18 (Formerly RBCZ 13294/15) Department of Justice, Senior Assistant Law Officer (Civil Law) (Civil Litigation Unit 2) ____________________________________________________________________________ Form CALL-1