The Delhi High Court said that a citizen’s fundamental right to travel abroad cannot be curtailed through a “lookout circular” (LOC) in every case where there is a failure to pay a loan. Justice Subramanian Prasad of the Delhi High Court was hearing a case that sought to quash an LOC issued by the Bureau of Immigration (BOI), an agency under the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) responsible for immigration. LOCs are notices which restrict individuals from leaving India for specified offences. This is similar to the “no-fly list” in the US. The present case relates to a plea by the Bank of Baroda against one Shalini Khanna, who had provided guarantee for a credit facility to one Metaphor Exports Private Limited amounting to Rs 7 crores. Bank of Baroda claimed that almost 5.85 crores of this amounts were misappropriated by the firm’s directors, including Khanna. The bank had initiated proceedings before the Debt Recovery Tribunal. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), too, initiated a case under criminal conspiracy and cheating under the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) and the Prevention of Corruption Act. Quashing the LOC, Justice Prasad said that an LOC could not have been issued in this case as the amount of about Rs 7 crore could not be said to be ‘detrimental to India’s economic interests’. This criterion of “detrimental to economic interests” is frequently invoked to issue an LOC against individuals. This is done under the Centre’s office memorandum, which provides guidelines for issuing the circular in specified circumstances. This comes in the wake of repeated orders from across the country with courts frequently quashing such LOCs. The Delhi HC observed that such LOCs are not “feasible” to extract money from defaulters. The HC has also warned that such a circular is a “coercive measure” and must only be used “sparingly”. BharatPe founder Ashneer Grover and wife Madhuri Jain had also been stopped from their travel to New York in November last year based on an LOC issued by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW). The couple had also moved the Delhi HC against the LOC.