1708003 (Refugee)

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal considered the case of an applicant seeking a protection visa. The applicant, a young Sikh man from Punjab, India, claimed to have been affiliated with the banned All India Sikh Student Federation (SSF). He alleged that he was arrested, interrogated, and tortured by the Punjab Intelligence Branch in January 2016, and subsequently faced further police attention and surveillance, leading him to fear persecution upon return to India.

The primary legal issues before the Tribunal were whether the applicant met the criteria for a protection visa under section 36(2) of the Migration Act 1958, and if not, whether he was entitled to complementary protection. This involved assessing the applicant's claims of past persecution and the real chance of future persecution for reasons of political opinion or membership of a particular social group, as well as the availability of effective protection in India.

The Tribunal affirmed the delegate's decision not to grant the protection visa. It found that the applicant had not established a well-founded fear of persecution. The Tribunal considered the applicant's evidence, including documents presented shortly before the hearing, and assessed its credibility in light of the applicant's claims and the country information. Crucially, the Tribunal applied the principle that a real risk of significant harm must be established, and that this risk must be assessed in the context of whether effective protection measures are available from the authorities of the receiving country. The Tribunal concluded that the applicant had not demonstrated that he could not obtain protection from the Indian authorities, nor that he would face a real risk of significant harm that was not faced by the population generally.