The Delhi High Court recently ordered the passport officials to delete the father’s name from her minor son’s passport after ruling in favour of a single mother in a case.
The mother who filed the petition claimed that the boy had been abandoned by his father prior to birth and had been nurtured solely by her.
According to Justice Prathiba M. Singh, this is a case where the father has fully abandoned the child.
The bench stated that Clause 4.5.1 of Chapter 8 and Clause 4.1 of Chapter 9 would unquestionably be relevant in such a situation.
Accordingly, it is directed that the name of the child’s father be removed from the passport and a new passport be issued in the child’s favour without the father’s name due to the special and peculiar circumstances of this case.
The court stated that in some cases, both the surname and the name of the biological father may be modified or eliminated.
The court noted that both the Passport Manual and the OM cited by the Respondents acknowledge that passports can be issued in a variety of situations without the father’s name.
The bench made the point that, depending on the factual position that emerges in each case, such remedy should be taken into consideration. There is no absolute law that can be followed.
The court stated that there are numerous circumstances where the child’s passport application may have to be taken into consideration by the authorities in the case of marriage strife between the parents.
In order to have the name of the child’s father removed from his current passport or, in the alternative, to have a new passport issued to the child without including the father’s name, the single mother and her minor son filed a petition with the high court.
The mother of the petitioner argued that because she is raising the child alone and the father has completely abandoned it, the passport office shouldn’t insist that the father’s name be included in the child’s passport. The high court agreed with this argument in its ruling on April 19.
The consensual settlement and the fact that the desertion occurred even before the kid was born were other arguments made by the petitioner.
