Article 21 travel rights require fair procedure; a Look Out Circular cannot rest on loan default alone.

The Punjab and Haryana HC held that restriction on the right to travel abroad, as part of Article 21 personal liberty, must follow a fair and reasonable procedure. A Look Out Circular cannot be enforced without communicating the LOC and reasons and providing a meaningful post-decisional hearing; secrecy alone does not satisfy natural justice. The Court also noted that an LOC cannot be justified merely because a person is a guarantor for a corporate borrower with loan default, absent any FIR, criminal case, or other exceptional circumstance recognised by the applicable guidelines. Mechanical issuance was treated as arbitrary and unreasonable, and the LOC was quashed.

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Issues: (i) Whether the impugned Look Out Circular and the manner of its enforcement violated the petitioner's fundamental rights for want of supply of the LOC, reasons, and a post-decisional opportunity of hearing; (ii) Whether the LOC could be justified merely on the basis that the petitioner was a guarantor of a corporate borrower with a large loan default, in the absence of any criminal case or exceptional circumstance under the applicable guidelines.

Issue (i): Whether the impugned Look Out Circular and the manner of its enforcement violated the petitioner's fundamental rights for want of supply of the LOC, reasons, and a post-decisional opportunity of hearing.

Analysis: The right to travel abroad was treated as part of personal liberty under Article 21 of the Constitution of India, and any deprivation of that right had to follow a fair, just and reasonable procedure. The record showed that the petitioner was stopped at the airport on the basis of the LOC, but no copy of the LOC or reasons for issuance were furnished to her at the time, and the guidelines produced did not provide for a meaningful post-decisional hearing. The Court read the principles of natural justice into the regulatory framework and held that secrecy could not justify complete denial of communication and remedial hearing.

Conclusion: The non-supply of the LOC and reasons, coupled with the absence of a post-decisional hearing, was held to be unconstitutional and violative of Article 21.

Issue (ii): Whether the LOC could be justified merely on the basis that the petitioner was a guarantor of a corporate borrower with a large loan default, in the absence of any criminal case or exceptional circumstance under the applicable guidelines.

Analysis: The Court noted that no FIR or criminal case had been registered against the petitioner, and the request for LOC did not disclose any criminal accusation. The applicable office memoranda contemplated LOCs in exceptional cases affecting sovereignty, security, integrity, or economic interests of India, but the material on record did not establish such exceptional circumstances. Mere quantum of debt, suspicion of possible flight, or the petitioner's status as guarantor was found insufficient to justify such an extreme restriction. The issuing authority was found to have acted mechanically, and the bank's request was held to amount to an abuse of the process.

Conclusion: The LOC was held to be unjustified, arbitrary, illegal, and unreasonable, and the bank's request for issuance of the LOC was rejected.

Final Conclusion: The impugned LOC was quashed, the petitioner was permitted to travel abroad for her studies, compensatory costs were awarded against the bank, and the authorities were directed to remove any consequential entries and to incorporate safeguards of communication and post-decisional hearing in the LOC process.

Ratio Decidendi: A Look Out Circular that curtails the fundamental right to travel abroad must satisfy Article 21 by following a fair procedure that includes communication of the LOC and reasons, and it cannot be issued mechanically or sustained merely on suspicion or loan default absent legally recognised exceptional circumstances.

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