The Punjab and Haryana high court has ordered withdrawal of a look out circular (LOC) against an NRI issued by the Faridabad police in a domestic violence case.
The US citizen had approached the HC seeking directions restraining authorities from imposing any condition on his right to return to the United States of America (USA), where he has been residing for the last 25 years.
According to his lawyer, senior advocate Anil Malhotra, the NRI got married to a Faridabad woman in the USA and they had two children out of wedlock. However, their relationship soured and filed for divorce, decreed by a US court in August 2025.
However, the woman along with the two children came back to India. Later he came to know that her father got a domestic violence and criminal intimidation case registered in April 2025 against the NRI. According to Malhotra, when the NRI came to India on October 4, he was briefly detained at the airport in Chandigarh and allowed to leave only after an undertaking.
In the HC, he had argued that a coordinate bench has stayed any coercive steps in the FIR registered against him and a petition is pending seeking quashing of the FIR. The marriage was solemnised in the US. Hence, the domestic violence case could not have been registered. Moreover, he is not accused of any heinous offence, it was argued.
State’s counsel had opposed the plea arguing that the petitioner did not consent for biometrics. Hence, LOC can’t be revoked. The court observed that for obtaining biometrics of a person, an order from the magistrate is to be obtained, which is not there in the case in hand.
{{/usCountry}}State’s counsel had opposed the plea arguing that the petitioner did not consent for biometrics. Hence, LOC can’t be revoked. The court observed that for obtaining biometrics of a person, an order from the magistrate is to be obtained, which is not there in the case in hand.
{{/usCountry}}Moreover, a coordinate bench has already stayed any coercive steps against him. “Accordingly, there is no justification for issuing the LOC against the petitioner,” the court said, directing the commissioner of police, Faridabad, to issue instructions in two days to withdraw the LOC.