An Indian Muslim man, Sanaullah Khan Mohammed, who entered the US in 2016 on a tourist visa and then overstayed, and then sought asylum, citing persecution in India, was turned down by the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit as the judges found no merit in his application. They also ruled that Mohammed could not be protected from deportation, as India is a large country and he could be sent back to any other place in India.
Who is Sanaullah Khan Mohammed ?
According to court documents, Mohammed said his family used to run a slaughterhouse business and that led to tension. Around May 2016, he claimed a group “confronted him and his mother, threw rocks at him, and then beat him, all the while admonishing them to shutter the slaughterhouse”. Mohammed said local police intervened and dispersed the group. The attack left Mohammed with minor injuries.About a month later, Mohammed entered the US on a visitor visa, remained beyond the expiration date of December 25, 2016 and did not apply for asylum until January 28, 2019.The USCIS denied the asylum application as it did not come within the deadline. The case went to an immigration judge who also rejected the case and said Mohammed showed “neither past persecution nor a meaningful risk of future persecution”. Mohammed appealed for a review.The court observed that it did not have the jurisdiction to review the immigration judge’s order that the asylum application was untimely but on the issue of ‘withholding of removal’ — that he should not be deported to India, the court said it did not find any reason for not deporting Mohammed to India.
Court pointed out local police stopped the attack
Based on Mohammed’s account, the court said that the local police, in fact, stopped the 2016 attack. And Mohammed could not demonstrate that “the Indian government allowed the violence”. The bumps, scrapes and bruises Mohammed received in the incident did not compel the conclusion that he suffered persecution in India.“Mohammed’s challenges are even weaker because his family’s local slaughterhouse business that provoked the past violence is no longer in operation. Even more, Mohammed could live somewhere else within the very large country of India,” the court said.
