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Recently, there has been a lot of criticism against the government’s decision to issue an orange jacket for the ‘emigration required passports’ for the persons who haven’t passed their 10th grade. The Kerala HC bench composed of Acting Chief Justice Antony Dominic and Justice Seshadri Naidu has issued a notice to the centre with regard to a PIL challenging the order of the government to issue such passports and to remove the page containing the personal details of the holder as discriminatory.
The above PIL was filed by a lawyer Shamsuddeen Karunagappally and Shajahan who is an ECR card holder both hailing from the Kollam district of Kerala through C Uniikrishnan. The petitioners alleged that the issue of orange passports for non-matriculates who earn less than the taxable income is demeaning and discriminatory against the people with low educational and economic status.
The petitioners argue that there is no perceivable purpose served by the issuance of such passports except for the marking out of people of vulnerable status for further exploitation thereby violating the person’s fundamental right to privacy and of equality. The Government, on the other hand, had stated its purpose to be the helping of such migrant workers in difficult situations and getting easier access to aid and documents required. The petition says that in fact such passports might subject to more exploitation and present unnecessary details about their educational status to the wider public and not to the emigration officers online. It further points out that the passport can also come of use as a document of bond or security by the law in which case the credibility and genuineness of the orange cards will be subject to intense scrutiny and suspicion.
The emigration act provides that any person who has not completed matriculation or has not worked abroad at least three years needs emigration clearance to travel to 18 countries, including the United Arab Emirates(UAE), the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia(KSA), Qatar, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, Malaysia, Libya, Jordan, Yemen, Sudan, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Syria, Lebanon, Thailand and Iraq.
The petitioners point out that while the issuance of separate colour passports to diplomats and government officials is justified, there is no intelligible differentia to classify poorly educated persons as a separate class for issuing different colour passport.
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