LAHORE: The Lahore High Court (LHC) has summoned an immigration officer from Sialkot International Airport, along with the relevant record, over the alleged seizure of a passport and travel documents from a woman travelling for Umrah.
Justice Haroon Dugal heard the woman’s petition. Assistant Attorney General Shakeel Pasha appeared before the court on its direction.
According to the petitioner, immigration authorities took her passport and other travel documents from her. The petition argued that taking the passport into custody was a violation of the constitution.
The court ordered the return of the passport and other documents, directing immigration authorities to return the passport of the woman travelling for Umrah. It summoned the immigration officer concerned from Sialkot airport, with the record, at the next hearing.
A passport is issued by the state but, once issued, functions as a document the holder is entitled to possess. The constitutional provision engaged is the right to freedom of movement, which includes the right to leave the country subject to law.
Immigration authorities do hold lawful powers to prevent departure in defined circumstances — where a person’s name appears on the Exit Control List, where there is a court order restraining travel, or where documents are suspected to be fraudulent. Those powers are exercised under specific legal authority and generate a record.
What the court’s order signals is that the authority for this particular seizure has not been demonstrated. Summoning the officer with the record, rather than simply disposing of the matter once the passport was ordered returned, indicates the court intends to examine the basis on which the document was taken.
Passengers being prevented from boarding — commonly described as offloading — has been a recurring subject of litigation and parliamentary questioning in Pakistan.
The practice has a legitimate function. Immigration officers screen for human trafficking, for travellers using documents that do not belong to them, and for individuals subject to legal restraint. Pakistan has faced sustained international pressure over irregular migration routed through its airports, and frontline officers operate under instruction to intervene where indicators are present.
The complaint that recurs concerns the exercise of that discretion: passengers stopped without a stated reason, documents retained without a receipt, and no clear mechanism for challenge short of approaching a court.
Pilgrimage travel adds a dimension. Umrah journeys are typically booked through operators on fixed group itineraries with non-refundable components. A traveller stopped at the airport does not simply reschedule — the package is generally lost.
That is part of why such cases reach the high court rather than being resolved administratively. By the time an internal remedy could work, the journey has already been forfeited.
The immediate relief has been granted: the court has ordered the documents returned. The remaining question is the one the summons is designed to answer — under what authority the passport was taken, and whether a record of that decision exists.
The officer is to appear at the next hearing with the record. No date was specified in the proceedings reported.
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