High Court Australia allowed appeal by asylum seeker whose application relied on his membership of the " movement led by a benevolent Muslim industrialist Dawood Ibrahim"-Most others know Dawood Ibrahim to be an Indian gangster and jihadi who works with Pakistan’s ISI
The appellant advanced the following history. He was an active member of the Indian Union Muslim League and of a committee of the Jihad Movement. He was president of an organisation in his village in Tamil Nadu associated with a movement led by a benevolent Muslim industrialist, Dawood Ibrahim , whom he had met in Bombay. He was arrested with 30 other Muslims on 4 December 1998 and accused of planning to plant bombs. He was severely beaten before being released on 10 December 1998. He decided to flee India to save his life. He was arrested again some time after 11 January 1999 and beaten by the police, who unsuccessfully demanded his passport. He appeared to say that he had also been arrested on 15 April 1999, following the destruction of the local Hindu Temple, detained for two weeks, and tortured.
(Orders : Appeal allowed.Order absolute for a writ of mandamus directed to the second respondent, requiring the second respondent to determine according to law the application for review of the decision of the delegate of the first respondent dated 15 March 2000)
A man claiming to be member of an Islamic group who was arrested in India for planning a bomb attack today won a High Court case against Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone.
The High Court ruled a member of the Refugee Review Tribunal (RRT) did not allow the man, known as Naff, procedural fairness.
It quashed the RRT's decision to refuse Naff refugee status and ordered it to redetermine his application for a review of the case.
Naff is a Muslim Tamil who said he was an active member of the Indian Union Muslim League and of a committee of the Jihad Movement.
He was president of an organisation in his village associated with a movement led by a benevolent Muslim industrialist, Dawood Ibrahim, whom he said he met in Bombay.
Naff was arrested with 30 other Muslims in India in December 1998 and accused of planning to plant bombs.
He said he was severely beaten before being released a few days later and later decided to flee India to save his life.
In March 2000, an Australian Immigration Department officer refused Naff's application for a protection visa, rejecting his claim he met Ibrahim in India and that he was involved with the Jihad Movement.
Naff applied to the RRT for review of that decision.
The RRT held a hearing into Naff's case in February 2002, with questioning revealing inconsistencies in his evidence, including the dates he was detained and the number of detentions.
At the end of the hearing, the RRT member told Naff that given the inconsistencies she would write to him asking for more information.
However, she failed to write and instead the RRT rejected his application, saying Ibrahim was regarded by Indian authorities as a gangster so he was unlikely to have travelled to India and met Naff.
The RRT also said belonging to the Jihad Movement contradicted Naff's claim of opposing violence.
The Federal Court of Australia dismissed Naff's application for orders quashing the RRT decision.
However, the High Court granted Naff special leave to appeal over the failure of the RRT member to write to him.
The court today held that with her closing remarks, the RRT member was acknowledging that the review's purposes had not been completely fulfilled.
"She was indicating that she had not yet finished receiving the presentation of arguments by the appellant which he had been invited to make," the High Court said in its judgment.
"She was saying that procedural fairness required some further steps to be taken.
"It is clear that the tribunal member was in the best position to judge whether the review process was incomplete.
"Her conduct is only consistent with the formation of a firm impression that it was."
The High Court held that depriving Naff of the opportunity to answer questions was a breach of procedural fairness and unanimously allowed his appeal.
It quashed the RRT's review decision and ordered it to redetermine the application for review.
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