Delhi high court refuses to grant custody of girl to German father

The court said that the child is presently comfortably in India with her mother and maternal grandparents.

In a custodial dispute between an Indian mother and a German father, the Delhi High Court refused to grant the custody of a five-year-old girl to her father, who alleged the woman brought the child from Dubai to India without informing him.

The court said that the child is presently comfortably in India with her mother and maternal grandparents.

Following a marital discord between the couple, who were settled in Dubai, the girl had been staying with the mother.

The father had moved a habeas corpus petition seeking the girl’s custody saying he wanted to take his wife and the child to Germany, where he would be relocating. The mother had allegedly obtained emergency travel documents from the Indian embassy in Dubai, the father contended.

Disposing the petition, a bench of justice S Muralidhar and justice I S Mehta said the child should stay in India with her mother, a lawyer from Delhi.

“The child has never lived in Germany for any length of time and therefore, it would be a completely new environment for her as well,” the court said.