Pakistani asylum seeker wins landmark £100,000 case against UK Home Office
High Court rules Nadra Almas was unlawfully detained and failed by authorities over 16 years
BIRMINGHAM: A Pakistani asylum seeker who overstayed her student visa has been awarded nearly £100,000 in damages after a British judge ruled she had been unlawfully detained and subjected to “outrageous” treatment by the Home Office.
Nadra Tabasam Almas, who arrived in the UK in 2004, fought a 16-year legal battle arguing that, as a Christian, she would face persecution if forced to return to Pakistan.
The case reached the High Court in Birmingham after the government appealed a lower court’s decision to compensate her. The appeal was dismissed, upholding the ruling that she suffered significant rights violations.
Detained and handcuffed
Almas originally entered Britain on a student visa, which expired five months later. Despite remaining in the country, she continued to make applications for legal status between 2005 and 2014. However, in 2018, she was detained by Home Office officials, handcuffed, and told she would be deported.
She was taken to Yarl’s Wood removal centre and held for two weeks before being released. The court found that the Home Office had failed to properly assess alternatives to detention, and a judge later ruled that her detention was unlawful.
Son granted Refugee status
The case gained further significance when her son, then 26 years old, was granted refugee status in 2018 on the same grounds that Almas had applied. Despite this, the Home Office continued to restrict her movement and denied her the right to work or access public funds.
For nearly three years after her release from Yarl’s Wood, she remained under strict conditions that limited her ability to travel, work, or live freely. The court ruled that these restrictions severely impacted her mental and emotional well-being, with Almas stating that she felt “like a criminal” and struggled with self-esteem due to her reliance on friends and family for financial support.
'Reckless disregard for rights'
Recorder McNeill, the original judge in the case, ruled that the Home Office had displayed a “reckless disregard” for Almas’s basic rights. The ruling emphasised that the delay in granting her refugee status – spanning two years and nine months – breached her right to family life under the Human Rights Act.
“The rights at stake were the most basic rights of liberty of the individual. [Ms Almas] feared to return to Pakistan for reasons of her religion and personal safety, which she clearly expressed to [the Home Office] on being detained, and was, indeed, in due course granted refugee status, thus vindicating the genuineness of her fears,” McNeill stated in the ruling.
The damages awarded, totalling £98,757.04, were deemed appropriate given the scale of the breaches involved. In addition, legal costs of £30,000 were also imposed on the Home Office.
Government appeal dismissed
The Home Office attempted to appeal both the ruling and the amount of compensation, arguing that Almas’s detention was not unlawful and that the procedural breaches – such as missing signatures on key documents – were minor. However, according to reports in British media, the appeal was dismissed by Justice Ritchie, who upheld the original decision, ruling that the Home Office had failed to justify its actions.
“These breaches were not trivial or minor,” Justice Ritchie stated. “The Recorder’s rulings on unlawful detention due to breaches of policy were logical, supported by the evidence, and her unchallenged findings of fact.”
The ruling has been seen as a landmark decision reinforcing the legal protections for asylum seekers and visa overstayers in the UK.