Woman alleges minor children abducted by ex-husband from US, SC seeks govt response

New Delhi, Sep 28 (IANS) The Supreme Court on Tuesday sought reply from the CBI, the Tamil Nadu government, and others, on a woman's plea alleging that her ex-husband has abducted her two minor children from the US.

Advocate Prabhjit Jauhar, representing the woman, submitted before a bench headed by Justice A.M. Khanwilkar that his client's ex-husband violated the US court order and allegedly abducted two minor children, who could not be traced since this August. The woman alleged that the husband has breached the in-court settlement agreement passed by a court in Ohio in July, and moved the top court seeking directions to the authorities to produce her children before the court.

The petitioner contended that her daughter is a permanent resident of the US, while her son holds an American passport. Jauhar argued that children have been taken to an "undisclosed destination", as they are neither in Chennai nor at Tamil Nadu's Virudhnagar, and that his client suspects they have been taken to Maharashtra.

After hearing the arguments on the matter, the top court issued notice to the CBI, the Tamil Nadu government, petitioner's the ex-husband, and others.

The plea said the minor children have been illegally and unlawfully removed from the custody of the petitioner, the ex-wife, on August 16, 2021 by the respondent number two (ex-husband) father.

The plea police had visited her ex-husband's parental house, but children were not there.

According to the plea, in 2008, the couple had got married in Chennai and within a month, they moved to US' Delaware. In May this year, the parties were granted divorce and a final shared parenting in-court agreement was settled and signed.