Chintan Agrawal v. Union of India

1. The present petition has been filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, whereby the petitioner has assailed the communication/reply dated 04.08.2025 issued by respondent no. 2 in response to the legal notice dated 24.07.2025 issued by the petitioner. The petitioner has further prayed for a direction to the concerned authorities to correct his date of birth and remove the „Emigration Check Required‟ (ECR) status from his passport.

2. Briefly stated, the facts of the present case, as set out in the petition, are that the petitioner was born on 09.11.2003 at G.G. Medical Institute Centre, Agra. It is stated that although his birth certificate, bearing Registration No. 56, was issued by Registrar (Births and Deaths), Agra Municipal Corporation, it erroneously recorded his date of birth as 09.09.2003. It is further stated that the said error was corrected on 28.10.2006, whereupon the petitioner‟s correct date of birth was recorded as 09.11.2003 in the birth records. It is the case of the petitioner that, while applying for his passport, his parents had inadvertently submitted the earlier birth certificate containing the incorrect date of birth, i.e., 09.09.2003. Consequently, the passport was issued in the year 2011 and was subsequently renewed in the years 2016 and 2021 by the Regional Passport Office, Ghaziabad, without any correction in the date of birth. It is further stated that after attaining the age of majority, the petitioner applied for renewal of his passport and, on that occasion, submitted the corrected birth certificate. However, the Regional Passport Office declined to carry out the requested correction and thereafter issued Passport No. C1486940 reflecting the incorrect date of birth. It is stated that, thereafter, the petitioner issued a legal notice dated 24.07.2025 to the respondents seeking correction of his date of birth in the passport. The said request was rejected by the respondents through the impugned reply, which has been challenged in the present petition.

3. At the outset, when the matter was taken up, the learned counsel appearing for the respondents raised a preliminary objection regarding the territorial jurisdiction of this Court to entertain the present petition. Accordingly, this Court has heard the learned counsel for the petitioner as well as the learned counsel for the respondents on the limited question of territorial jurisdiction before proceeding further.

4. The learned counsel appearing for the petitioner submits that the impugned reply, which forms the foundation of the present writ petition, rejecting the petitioner's request for correction of his date of birth in the passport, has been issued without due consideration of the documents placed on record. It is further submitted that since the office of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) is situated in Delhi, and the Regional Passport Office, Ghaziabad functions under the administrative control and directions of the MEA, this Court has the necessary territorial jurisdiction to entertain the present petition. Reliance has also been placed on the corrected birth certificate, Voter Identity Card, Aadhaar Card, Class X marksheet, and PAN Card, all of which reflect the petitioner's correct date of birth. On these grounds, it is prayed that this Court may hold that it possesses territorial jurisdiction to entertain the present petition.

5. Per contra, the learned counsel appearing for the respondents submits that the petitioner‟s grievance and cause of action arises entirely within the State of Uttar Pradesh. It is contended that the impugned reply was issued by the Regional Passport Office, Ghaziabad, and that the petitioner‟s birth certificate, passport, Class X marksheet, Aadhaar Card, PAN Card, and Voter Identity Card were all issued by authorities situated in Uttar Pradesh. It is submitted that the mere fact that the office of the Ministry of External Affairs is located in Delhi cannot, by itself, confer territorial jurisdiction upon this Court, particularly when the entire cause of action, in its substantive and operative aspects, has arisen within the State of Uttar Pradesh. It is, therefore, prayed that the present petition be dismissed on the ground of lack of territorial jurisdiction, while leaving it open to the petitioner to approach the jurisdictional High Court.

6. This Court has heard the learned counsel for the parties on the question of territorial jurisdiction and has carefully perused the material placed on record.

7. The question that arises for consideration before this Court is whether it has the territorial jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India to entertain the present writ petition.

8. A perusal of the record reveals that the original birth certificate bearing Registration No. 56 was issued by the office of the Registrar (Births and Deaths), Agra Municipal Corporation, on 20.09.2003. However, the said certificate had recorded the petitioner's date of birth as 09.09.2003, which as per petitioner, was incorrect. Thereafter, an application for correction of the birth certificate was made before the Registrar (Births and Deaths), Agra Municipal Corporation, Agra, and on 28.10.2006, a corrected birth certificate recording the petitioner‟s date of birth as 09.11.2003 was issued. Further, when an application for issuance of the petitioner's passport was made in the year 2011, the petitioner was a minor and his parents inadvertently submitted the earlier birth certificate allegedly recording the incorrect date of birth. Consequently, the passport was issued with the incorrect date of birth and was subsequently renewed in the years 2016 and 2021 without any correction. After attaining majority, the petitioner had approached the Regional Passport Office, Ghaziabad, seeking rectification of his date of birth in his passport. However, the petitioner‟s request for correction was ultimately rejected by the impugned communication dated 04.08.2025 issued by the Regional Passport Office, Ghaziabad

9. In view of the above facts, it is evident that both the authorities which had issued and subsequently corrected the birth certificate, as well as the Regional Passport Office which declined the petitioner‟s request for correction, are situated in the State of Uttar Pradesh. Thus, the authorities directly connected with the petitioner‟s grievance are located outside the territorial jurisdiction of this Court. The petitioner himself is a resident of State of Uttar Pradesh.

10. In Kusum Ingots & Alloys Ltd. v. Union of India: (2004) 6 SCC 254, the Hon‟ble Supreme Court examined the scope of territorial jurisdiction under Article 226(2) of the Constitution of India and held that the mere location of the seat of the Union Government or the authority concerned does not, by itself, confer territorial jurisdiction upon a High Court. The Court observed that jurisdiction under Article 226 is determined by whether any part of the cause of action has arisen within the territorial limits of the High Court concerned. It was further held that the enactment of a parliamentary legislation or the location of the authority administering such legislation cannot, in itself, constitute a cause of action. Rather, the cause of action arises only when the implementation of the statute or the action of the concerned authority results in civil consequences for the aggrieved party within the territorial jurisdiction of the Court.

11. Further, the concept of forum conveniens, as explained by the Hon‟ble Supreme Court in Kusum Ingots & Alloys Ltd. (supra) is as under: “Forum conveniens

30. We must, however, remind ourselves that even if a small part of cause of action arises within the territorial jurisdiction of the High Court, the same by itself may not be considered to be a determinative factor compelling the High Court to decide the matter on merit. In appropriate cases, the Court may refuse to exercise its discretionary jurisdiction by invoking the doctrine of forum conveniens. [See Bhagat Singh Bugga v.Dewan Jagbir Sawhney [1941 SCC OnLine Cal 247: AIR 1941 Cal 670: ILR (1941) 1 Cal 490], Madanlal Jalan v. Madanlal [1945 SCC OnLine Cal 145: (1944-45) 49 CWN 357: AIR 1949 Cal 495], Bharat Coking Coal Ltd. v. Jharia Talkies & Cold Storage (P) Ltd. [1997 CWN 122], S.S. Jain & Co. v. Union of India [1993 SCC OnLine Cal 306: (1994) 1 CHN 445] and New Horizons Ltd. v. Union of India [(1997) 89 Comp Cas 785: 1993 SCC OnLine Del 564: AIR 1994 Del 126].]”

12. A similar view was also taken by the Hon‟ble Supreme Court in State of Goa v. Summit Online Trade Solutions (P) Ltd.: (2023) 7 SCC 791, wherein it has been held as under: