JUDGMENT :

Manish Pitale, J.

The petitioner is seeking a writ of habeas corpus for a direction to the respondents, particularly, respondent No.2 to produce minor child born out of the marriage between the petitioner (husband) and respondent No.2 (wife) and further direction for handing over the minor child to the petitioner for being taken back to the United States of America (USA). Admittedly, the minor child is a citizen of USA. This is another case of discord in the matrimonial life of husband and wife, leading to one parent i.e. respondent No.2 – wife taking the minor child from foreign jurisdiction (USA) to India, without the consent of the petitioner - husband. As a consequence of the deterioration of relations between the parties, legal proceedings have been initiated in the USA as well as in India and in the backdrop of such acrimony, the petitioner has filed the present writ petition seeking the aforesaid reliefs.

2. At the stage of final arguments in this petition, the learned counsel appearing for rival parties have relied upon a number of judgments of the Hon’ble Supreme Court and this Court, in support of their respective stands. In fact, the same judgments have been interpreted in different ways by the learned counsel, in order to contend that such judgments support their respective arguments. By now, there are considerable number of judicial pronouncements in the context of situations similar to the one that arises in the present case, in the backdrop of large number of Indian immigrants landing up in the western world, particularly USA, for greener pastures. The couples in such cases are usually well educated and financially sound, as both are working individuals and there is no dearth of resources. Perhaps, it is the problem of plenty, which is leading to such frequent instances of one parent knocking the door of the writ Court, invoking the writ of habeas corpus to secure the custody of minor child or children, who are taken away by the other parent and brought to India. There is no dearth of intelligence and resources in the parties, but, there is lack of wisdom and maturity, thereby frequently bringing such cases to the writ Court for decision.

3. The detailed submissions made on behalf of the rival parties would necessarily require reference to and analysis of the judgments relied upon, but, before referring to the judgments and analyzing them, it would be necessary to refer to the sequence of events, to properly apply the position of law to the facts of the present case. There can be no doubt about the fact that even when the position of law is reasonably clear, the case in hand needs to be decided on its own facts. Hence, it would be appropriate to narrate the sequence of events discernible from the material placed on record on behalf of the rival parties.

SEQUENCE OF EVENTS

4. The petitioner is a Software Engineer, who started working with the multinational company “Infosys” in May, 2006, in the USA, initially living in Charlotte, NC. In April, 2009, the petitioner moved to Phoenix, Arizona (USA). In February, 2012, the petitioner joined “American Express” as a Staff Engineer/Director and he has applied for green card for permanent residence in the USA in EB2 category. He claims that the said application is in its final stages of processing.

5. The petitioner and respondent No.2 got in touch with each other through a matrimonial site in the year 2013, when the respondent No.2 was liv