Aditya’s mom goes ‘missing’ to avoid giving up custody

American citizen V Ravi Chandran’s wait to be with his seven-year-old son Aditya seems to be unending. Bhadra Sinha reports.

American citizen V Ravi Chandran’s wait to be with his seven-year-old son Aditya seems to be unending.

HT Image

Chandran, who had been fighting a custody battle in India for 30 months, has now approached the Supreme Court claiming that his wife is untraceable.

The aeronautical engineer had won a case last year when on November 17, the SC asked his wife, Vijayshree Voora, to return to the US with son and husband within 15 days of the order. In case of disobedience, Voora was to lose the child’s custody to her husband.

However, his wife allegedly violated the SC order, which asked her to submit to the jurisdiction of American court, granting joint custody.

Now Chandran has claimed that Voora is not at the two Indian addresses that were furnished to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). He added that the two Chennai addresses proved fictitious.

The addresses were provided to the agency in accordance with the SC order that required Voora to keep the agency informed of her whereabouts.

Even as she remains “missing”, Voora too has moved the court seeking extension of the deadline that was set for her to return to US.

It was in October last year that on the directions of SC, CBI had traced Chandran’s son in Chennai and produced him before the court.

Voora, a Green Card holder had fled to India with her son after the US court had in 2007 ordered joint custody of the child in a divorce dispute.

What went against Voora was the fact that she kept moving frequently to avoid police detection, despite an SC notice, seeking her presence in the court.

The Supreme Court had to seek CBI’s help to trace her and the child.