Case Document

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HCAL 506/2022

[2026] HKCFI 3249

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF FIRST INSTANCE

CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW LIST NO 506 OF 2022

BETWEEN
	Dulal Md	Applicant
	and
	Torture Claims Appeal Board	Putative Respondent
	and
	Director of Immigration	Putative Interested Party

Application for Leave to Apply for Judicial Review

NOTIFICATION of the Judge’s decision (Ord 53 r 3)

Following:

consideration of the documents only; or

consideration of the documents and oral submissions by the Applicant in open court;

Order by Deputy High Court Judge Bruno Chan:

Leave to apply for judicial review be refused.

Observations for the Applicant:

1.The Applicant is a 46-year-old national of Bangladesh who entered Hong Kong illegally on 15 June 2018 and surrendered to the Immigration Department on 19 June 2018 when he raised a non-refoulement claim for protection on the basis that if he returned to Bangladesh he would be harmed or killed by certain local supporters of the political party Awami League (“AL”) as he supported their rival Bangladesh Nationalist Party (“BNP”) and that he refused to pay them extortion money. He was subsequently released on recognizance pending the determination of his claim.

2.The Applicant was born and raised in Village Hajipur, District Dhaka, Bangladesh. After leaving school he worked in a garment factory and later ran his own garments shop in his home district, got married and raised a family with 2 children, and followed his family’s tradition to support BNP regularly attended their local meetings and activities, during which he and his fellow BNP supporters would often come into violent conflicts with the local AL supporters.

3.In 2013, some local AL supporters started coming to his shop demanding for extortion money, and when he initially refused their demands, they then made threats against him that he subsequently relented and paid them whatever he could afford to avoid further troubles from them.

4.However, those AL supporters became greedy and soon demanded for more money that the Applicant eventually could no longer afford to pay them anything.

5.One night in about 2016 while walking home from work, the Applicant was ambushed by several AL supporters who attacked him with wooden sticks until he lost consciousness, and was subsequently taken by some passers-by to a local clinic for medical treatments.

6.On another occasion in 2016 a group of AL supporters came to his home and dragged the Applicant out into the street where they beat him severely, and before they left they warned the Applicant to leave the village or else they would kill him.

7.As a result, the Applicant became fearful for his life and fled to other cities in Rangpur, Faridpur and Dhaka to take shelter in the place of various friends, and on 5 June 2018 he departed Bangladesh for China, and from there he later sneaked into Hong Kong and subsequently raised his non-refoulement claim for protection, for which he completed a Non-refoulement Claim Form (“NCF”) on 27 December 2018 and attended screening interview before the Immigration Department with legal representation from the Duty Lawyer Service (“DLS”).

8.By a Notice of Decision dated 29 January 2019, the Director of Immigration (“Director”) rejected the Applicant’s claim on all the applicable grounds including risk of torture under Part VIIC of the Immigration Ordinance, Cap 115 (“Torture Risk”), risk of his absolute or non-derogable rights under the Hong Kong Bill of Rights Ordinance, Cap 383 (“HKBOR”) being violated including right to life under Article 2 (“BOR 2 Risk”), risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment under Article 3 of HKBOR (“BOR 3 Risk”), and risk of persecution with reference to the non-refoulement principle under Article 33 of the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (“Persecution Risk”).

9.In his decision, the Director took into account of all the relevant circumstances of the Applicant’s claim and found material inconsistencies and discrepancies in his evidence that it is doubtful of his claim of fear of harm from some local AL supporters for political reasons that caused him to leave his country to come to Hong Kong to seek protection, that even if his account of events prior to his departure of Bangladesh were true that there is no substantial risk of him being ill-treated or killed by those local AL supporters upon his return to Bangladesh due to the low intensity and frequency of past ill-treatment from them, nor is there evidence of any real intention of them to seriously harm or kill him or any political reason for them to do so given that he was just an ordinary BNP supporter without any official post in the party, that in any event in the absence of any official involvement that state or police protection would be available to the Applicant if resorted to, and that reliable and objective Country of Origin Information (“COI”) show that reasonable internal relocation alternatives are available in Bangladesh with a large population of 159 million people spread across a vast territory of more than 130,000 square kilometers that it would not be unduly harsh for the Applicant as an able-bodied adult with working experience to move to other areas of the country away from his home district in large cities such as Chittagong or Faridpur where it would be difficult if not impossible for anyone to locate him.

10.On 11 February 2019, the Applicant lodged an appeal to the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“Board”) against the Director’s decision, and for which he attended an oral hearing on 6 May 2022 before the Board during which he gave evidence and answered questions raised of his claim by the Adjudicator for the Board. On 13 June 2022 his appeal was dismissed by the Board which also confirmed the Director’s decision.

11.In its decision[1], the Board found material inconsistencies discrepancies and contradictions in the Applicant’s evidence that it doubted and rejected the credibility of his claim of fear of harm from any AL people over any political disputes or extortion money that caused him to leave his country to come to Hong Kong to seek protection, and that it is not accepted that he had ever been involved in politics or involved with BNP or any pollical party in any way whatsoever or that he had been extorted for money prior to his leaving his country or that he will face any real risk of any harm for his claimed reasons upon his return to Bangladesh that it concluded that his that his claim for non-refoulement protection failed on all applicable grounds.

12.On 21 June 2022, the Applicant filed his Form 86 for leave to apply for judicial review of the Board’s decision, but no ground for seeking relief was given in his Form or in his supporting affirmation of the same date in which he just asserted that the decision has many errors but without providing any details or particulars or elaboration as to what they are, nor was he able to do so at the hearing of his application. As such, and in the absence of any error of law or irrationality or procedural unfairness in his process before the Board or in its decision being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, I do not find any reasonably arguable basis for his intended challenge of the Board’s decision.

13.As has been repeatedly emphasized by the Court of Appeal, judicial review does not operate as a rehearing of a non-refoulement claim when the proper occasion for the Applicant to present and articulate his claim is in the screening process and interview before the Immigration Department and in the process before the Board where the evaluation of the risk of harm is primarily a matter for the Director and the Board as they are entitled to make such evaluation based on the evidence available to them that the court will not usurp their role as primary decision makers in the absence of any legal error or procedural unfairness or irrationality in their decisions being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, as judicial review is not an avenue for revisiting the assessment by them in the hope that the court may consider the matter afresh: Re Lakhwinder Singh [2018] HKCA 246; Re Daljit Singh [2018] HKCA 328; Re Mudannayakalage Chaminda Pushpa Kumara [2018] HKCA 400; and Nupur Mst v Director of Immigration [2018] HKCA 524.

14.In the Applicant’s case, the Board rejected his claim essentially on its adverse finding on his credibility for the thorough and detailed analysis and reasoning set out in its decision with the benefit of hearing him in his oral evidence and his answers to questions raised of his claim, and in the absence of any error of law or procedural unfairness in his process before the Board or in its decision being clearly and properly identified by the Applicant, I do not find any reasonably arguable basis to challenge the finding of the Board.

15.Furthermore, the fact is that it has also been correctly established by the Director in his decision that the risk of harm in the Applicant’s claim even if real is a localized one and that it is not unreasonable or unsafe for him to relocate to other part of Bangladesh, a decision also agreed and confirmed by the Board, there is simply no justification to afford him with non-refoulement protection in Hong Kong: see TK v Jenkins & Anor [2013] 1 HKC 526.

16.In the premises, and having considered the decisions of both the Director and the Board with rigorous examination and anxious scrutiny, I do not find any error of law or procedural unfairness in either of them, nor any failure on their part to apply high standards of fairness in their consideration and assessment of the Applicant’s claim.

17.As I am for the given reasons not satisfied that there is any prospect of success in the Applicant’s intended application for judicial review, I therefore refuse to grant leave and accordingly dismiss his application.

Dated the 9^th day of June 2026

(Chung Lai Fan, Christine)
for Registrar, High Court

Where leave to apply has been granted, Applicants and their legal advisers are reminded of their obligation to reconsider the merits of their application in the light of the Respondent’s evidence

Notes for the Applicant: If leave has been granted, the Applicant or the Applicant’s solicitors must:
a) serve on the respondent and such interested parties as may be directed by the Court the order granting leave and any directions given within 14 days after the leave was granted (Order 53, rule 4A); b) issue the originating summons within 14 days after the grant of leave and serve it in accordance with Order 53, rule 5; and c) supply to every other party copies of every affidavit which the Applicant proposes to use at the hearing, including the affidavit in support of the application for leave (Order 53, rule 6(5)).		Sent to the Applicant on 9 June 2026 Dulal Md Applicant’s ref. no.: Nil.		Sent to the Putative Respondent / the Putative Respondent’s solicitors / such Putative Interested Parties as may be directed by the Court / the Putative Interested Parties’ solicitors on 9 June 2026 Torture Claims Appeal Board Putative Respondent’s ref. no.: USM 15549/19/2/68/B1985 Director of Immigration Putative Interested Party’s ref. no.: QA T/C 5094/18 (Formerly RBCZ 10931/18) Department of Justice, Senior Assistant Law Officer (Civil Law) (Civil Litigation Unit 2)