An Indian national who was seeking asylum on the grounds that he would be persecuted in his country for his political views and religious beliefs, has lost his bid to have the visa refusal overturned in the Federal Circuit Court.
The man who cannot be named for legal reasons claimed that he could suffer serious harm and would most likely face persecution, because of his association with Shiromani Akali Dal (Amritsar), if he were to return to India.
Shiromani Akali Dal (Amritsar), also known as Shiromani Akali Dal (Mann) or SAD (A) is a political party in Punjab that advocates the establishment of Khalistan, a separate Sikh homeland.
The asylum seeker also claimed that he has been in hiding after cutting his hair, which is against his Sikh religion.
The man arrived in Australia on a visitor visa on 22 November 2015, which expired in February 2016. However, he continued to live in the country illegally until he was detained and transferred to an immigration detention centre in April 2018.
Days later, he filed for a protection visa, which was refused by the Immigration Department. He then challenged the department’s decision at the Administrative Appeals Tribunal in May 2018.
He told the Tribunal that he was twice beaten up by the police in India in 2014 and 2015 in the presence of his son, who as a result was diagnosed with depression.
As part of the documentary evidence, the asylum seeker further submitted a letter from the office secretary of the SAD (A) along with his membership card and photographs, to corroborate his claims.
However, the Tribunal rejected his claim and found that some of the oral evidence he submitted “lacked credibility", the photographs that he filed were of “poor quality,” and noted that there was no detail within the letter from the SAD (A) representative regarding his ill-treatment.
The Tribunal also found his knowledge about the SAD (A) party was “scant,” and that his explanation for not being aware of certain party matters to be “implausible.”
In October 2018, he then filed an application for a judicial review of the Tribunal’s decision in the Federal Circuit Court, which too was rejected, earlier this week.
According to figures released by the Refugee Council of Australia, Indians were among the top three nationalities seeking asylum after arriving by plane, second only to Malaysia and China in 2018-2019.
But only 8% of those applicants were found to have a valid claim, as per the data.
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