“The said committee shall be put in place within 3 months,” the Karnataka High Court has recorded, directing the State to set up district committees on illegal immigrants as it quashed the crimes registered against a Bengaluru doctor who says he helped identify persons alleged to be illegal immigrants.
Bengaluru: The crimes registered against a Bengaluru-based doctor have been quashed by the Karnataka High Court, which on Friday allowed his criminal petitions and, in disposing of his writ petition, directed the State to set up district-level committees to deal with illegal immigrants in line with the Union Home Ministry’s standard operating procedure [Nagendrappa T v. State of Karnataka].
The order in Writ Petition No. 24641 of 2026 and the connected criminal petitions was passed by Justice M Nagaprasanna. Its operative portion, as dictated in court, reads that the criminal petitions are allowed and that the crimes registered stand quashed. The detailed order was not available at the time of writing, so the reasons for quashing, and any ruling on the petitioner’s claim for compensation, are not yet known.
The committees the State must now set up
In disposing of the writ petition, the Court directed the State to set up district-level committees on illegal immigrants, in line with the Union Home Ministry’s procedure, and recorded:
The said committee shall be put in place within 3 months.
That direction ties into the district-level task forces contemplated by the Ministry’s procedure of May 2, 2025. The report of the order does not mention a separate deportation direction.
The doctor’s account
The petitioner says he helped identify six persons alleged to be illegal Bangladeshi immigrants to the authorities, and that he was then arrested on a complaint lodged by one of them, filed about fifteen minutes after the investigating officer wrote to the Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO) that the complainant was an illegal immigrant who needed to be detained for deportation. He describes the complaints against him as retaliatory. These are the petitioner’s allegations and the status of the persons concerned has not been adjudicated in these proceedings.
His prayers were for quashing of his arrest and of the counter-FIRs, compensation for unlawful detention, and the deportation of the six individuals, who he said were produced before the FRRO on July 22, 2026 but remain in India. His counsel argued that the arrest flowed from the failure to implement the Centre’s own procedure for identifying and deporting illegal immigrants, relying on the Ministry of Home Affairs procedure of May 2, 2025 and its advisory of August 8, 2017. He also contended that all the alleged offences carried less than seven years’ imprisonment and that no notice under Section 35(3) of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita was served before the arrest.
What the Court said at earlier hearings
On August 6, 2026 the High Court called for strict implementation of the Home Ministry’s procedure. It orally referred to the District Special Task Forces contemplated by the May 2, 2025 procedure, observing that the State has to form a committee, and told the Union’s counsel that the procedure should be implemented fast. It directed the Bureau of Immigration and the FRRO to place on record the steps taken for identification and deportation.
In the preceding week, while hearing the quashing petitions, the Court had orally observed that the system must stop appeasing illegal immigrants by registering frivolous counter-cases against citizens who expose them. Oral observations are not part of an order and do not record a finding in this case.
Two strands to the order
On the criminal side, quashing ends the cases against the petitioner, and a person’s complaint against a citizen does not decide whether the complainant is a foreign national, which is a matter for the authorities under the Foreigners law. On the administrative side, the three-month direction turns a procedure framed by the Union into an obligation the State must operationalise district by district. Whether the committees are formed on time, and what they do, will be tested in practice, and nothing in the order adjudicates the nationality of any individual.
Case Title: Nagendrappa T v. State of Karnataka [Writ Petition No. 24641 of 2026 and connected criminal petitions]
Bench: Justice M Nagaprasanna, Karnataka High Court
Date of Order: October 16, 2026
Appearances: Advocate Girish Bhardwaj for the petitioner at the earlier hearing; Vinay Venugopal for the Union (Ministry of Home Affairs and FRRO) at the earlier hearing