Delhi HC grants two more weeks to Centre to respond to Professor Ashok Swain's plea against blacklisting order

New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Wednesday granted the Centre two more weeks to file its reply to a plea by academician Ashok Swain challenging a purported blacklisting order, barring him from entering India.

A request for additional time was made by the central government lawyer before Justice Purushaindra Kumar Kaurav.

"On request of respondent's counsel, two weeks further time to file reply is granted," the court said and listed the matter for next hearing on July 23.

The court had issued notice on Swain's petition in November 2025 and asked the Union Ministries of Home Affairs and External Affairs, Embassy of India to Sweden and Latvia and Bureau of Immigration to file their replies within three weeks.

The Embassy of India to Sweden and Latvia cancelled Swain's OCI Card under the Citizenship Act on February 8, 2024.

Swain, Professor and head of department at the Department of Peace and Conflict Research, Uppsala University in Sweden, asserted in his petition that he has been prevented from entering India based on a purported blacklisting order under the Foreigners Act, which was revealed to him in a counter affidavit filed by the Centre in his earlier petition on the issue.

He submitted that his aged mother, who lives in India was unwell, but he has not been able to visit her in the past several years.

He alleged that the authorities' action was pursuant to an undisclosed blacklisting order, the content and legal basis of which have neither been communicated to him nor tested on the touchstone of procedural safeguards mandated under the Citizenship Act, principles of natural justice and constitutional protections under Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution.

Swain sought the court's direction to the authorities to allow him entry into India on his OCI card, call for records pertaining to the purported blacklisting order and quash the blacklisting order or any other order restraining his entry here.

"'Despite two rounds of judicial review, respondents persisted in passing orders and imposing blacklisting based solely on sweeping and bald allegations, contents of which were never disclosed even to this court," the plea submitted.

"Such opacity by the respondents epitomizes arbitrariness and the denial of case particulars and refusal to supply evidence vitiates all administrative action under Article 14," the plea submitted.

The petition also cited the Centre's affidavit which stated that "the petitioner, Mr. Ashok Swain, is a Swedish national, an OCI cardholder, is a professor in Uppsala University, he had been blacklisted and barred from entering into territory of India in view of his anti-India writing and inflammatory speeches that reflected negatively on India and tarnished the image of the country in the international fora." The high court had earlier twice set aside the Centre's order cancelling the Overseas Citizenship of India (OCI) card of Swain and granted liberty to the authorities to issue a fresh show cause notice to him.