New Delhi, June 13: The Supreme Court on Friday suggested harsher punishment which will act as a deterrent for infiltrators entering India.

The Vacation Bench of Justices Arijit Pasayat and P P Naolekar remarked, “Considering the large number of infiltrators who come to India without valid document, there is a need for imposing stricter sentence.” The observations came during the hearing of an appeal filed by one Habib Ibrahim, who had infiltrated from Pakistan in 2004. The Bench refused to accept Ibrahim’s submission that he had illegally entered India to meet his wife and children in Jaipur as he did not know of the country’s immigration laws.

“The appellant’s feeble plea that he did not know that he is required to be in possession of valid document is without substance. Otherwise, he would not have obtained a transit visa for Nepal,” the apex court observed.

Ibrahim was arrested by the Rajasthan Police on January 13, 2004 at Vidhadhar Nagar bus stop. He was found to be in possession of a Pakistani passport and an expired Nepalese visa, but he did not have any documents (visa) to justify his presence in India.

A sessions court in Jaipur convicted Ibrahim under Sections 3 read with Section 14 of the Foreigners Act and sentenced him to five years imprisonment besides imposing a fine of Rs 25,000. The Rajasthan High Court, upheld the conviction and sentence, and thus dismissed his plea after which he approached the apex court.

Dismissing Ibrahim’s plea, the apex court said the prosecution’s evidence clearly established that the accused did not have a visa to stay in India. “The appellant had been issued a transit visa that too for Nepal for a period of six months. There was no valid document in possession of the appellant to stay in India. The only plea to justify his presence was that he had come to visit his wife and children. That does not give him any right to stay illegally in India,” the court observed.