The Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO) in Mumbai has directed actor Imran Khan, a US citizen holding an Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) card, to leave the country by October 28, citing alleged violations of the Immigration and Foreigners Act, 2025.
Former Punjab special chief secretary KBS Sidhu said fundamental rights under Article 19 do not extend to foreign nationals. As a person, he is protected by Articles 14 and 21, which guarantee equality before the law and personal liberty, but the freedom of speech and assembly under Article 19 belongs to Indian citizens alone,” Sidhu said. Khan was born in 1983 in Wisconsin, USA, to Nuzhat Khan, cousin of film star Aamir Khan, and California-based software engineer Anil Pal. He was granted Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) status under the Citizenship Act, 1955, which allows him a lifelong multiple-entry Indian visa.
Because he happens to be a public figure, the government panicked. “Cine star Imran Khan holds an American passport and an OCI card. “If he has breached the conditions of his stay, the Union home ministry’s immigration machinery, acting on the Mumbai Police’s report, is well within the law and India’s sovereign right to ask him to leave. “How can Imran be a threat to the administration? “Without any specific allegation against him, his mere presence in the crowd should not cause restlessness for the establishment. He can challenge this in a court of law—unless there are specific findings that he breached the law, he cannot be made to leave India. Advocate Ankur Sharma of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court noted that foreign nationals are expected to refrain from political activity. “As a foreign national, he should not be indulging in any protest or campaign against the Indian government.
He was one among thousands of people who gathered peacefully,” Memon said. This constitutes a breach of the rules under which he was granted OCI status,” said Sharma, who represents the Pakistani wife of a former CRPF constable ordered to leave India upon the expiry of her visa, an order subsequently stayed by the Jammu and Kashmir High Court. The notice, issued on Thursday, has divided legal experts over the Union government’s powers to deport the actor for participating in a peaceful public demonstration, and the legal remedies available to him Speaking to reporters before his detention, Khan said, “I am here as a citizen, to see why freedom of movement has been restricted and why people’s voices are being oppressed.
