New Delhi: The government will bring a Bill in the coming winter session of the parliament as part of its efforts to stop NRI husbands from abandoning their wives, external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj said on Wednesday.
“We have already launched an institutional mechanism, where you must have seen that 25 passports of such NRI husbands have been revoked. We are also bringing a Bill in this session where some more measures are being taken against those husbands,” she told reporters in Hyderabad.
Swaraj, who was in Hyderabad in connection with the Bharatiya Janata Party’s campaign for the December 7 Telangana assembly elections, was replying to a query.
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On November 13, the Supreme Court has also sought response from the Centre on a plea seeking mandatory arrest of NRIs deserting their wives and harassing them for dowry.
A bench comprising Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and Justices S.K. Kaul and K.M. Joseph issued notices to the Centre on the plea seeking that the deserted women be accorded legal and financial help, and their estranged NRI husbands be arrested after the filing of FIRs.
A group of eight women, who have allegedly been deserted by their NRI husbands and subjected to dowry harassment, have moved the apex court seeking relief including mandatory arrest of their estranged spouses and consular help in fighting cases abroad. As The Wire had reported before, the petition made startling allegations about the apathy of the Centre, the National Commission for Women and its officials towards the women.
(With PTI inputs)