Ranjit Bipana and Others v. Torture Claims Appeal Board / Non-refoulement Claims Petition Office

On 29 September 2026, the Court of Appeal (Kwan VP and Chow JA) handed down judgment in _Ranjit Bipana v Torture Claims Appeal Board / Non-refoulement Claims Petition Office_ [2026] HKCA 1754, allowing the appeal of the 2nd and 3rd applicants and dismissing the 1st applicant's appeal. Mr Jeffrey Tam, instructed by Daly & Associates and assigned by the Director of Legal Aid, acted for the appellants.

The applicants are Nepalese nationals. The 1st applicant overstayed a visitor visa in 2014 and lodged a non-refoulement claim based on feared harm from her brother and her husband's family arising from her inter-caste marriage. Her two children, born in Hong Kong in 2015 and 2018, lodged derivative claims. The 1st applicant acted for herself and the children throughout, in breach of O.80 r.2 of the Rules of the High Court. The Director rejected all three claims, and the Board dismissed the appeal on 15 May 2019, finding the 1st applicant not a witness of truth who had grossly exaggerated her claims.

The 1st applicant sought leave to apply for judicial review in 2019, later adding her children as co-applicants. Deputy High Court Judge Lung refused leave, holding that the 1st applicant had not identified any child-specific issues warranting separate consideration. The Court of Appeal allowed the children's appeal but dismissed the mother's.

The Court held that:

(1) The Board had failed to separately assess the 2nd and 3rd applicants' claims by reference to their personal circumstances, contrary to the principles in _Fabio Arlyn Timogan v Evan Ruth Esq_ [2020] HKCA 971. The Board treated the family's claims as one composite claim and, upon rejecting the 1st applicant's evidence, automatically dismissed the children's appeals without independent enquiry (§§22-24).

(2) The 1st applicant's challenges to the Board's credibility findings and its assessment of country information on inter-caste marriage were not reasonably arguable. The Board's conclusions were supported by its own evaluation of the evidence, including the 1st applicant's own concessions (§§28-33).

(3) The Judge below erred by focusing on the 1st applicant's submissions about child-specific issues without examining the Board's decision to see whether an independent assessment had been conducted (§38).

The Court granted the 2nd and 3rd applicants leave to re-amend their Form 86 to raise the composite-claim ground, but refused leave to the 1st applicant. No order was made as to costs, the appellants being legally aided.

For practitioners: where a parent pursues a non-refoulement claim on behalf of unrepresented minor children, the Board's failure to conduct an independent assessment of each child's personal circumstances is a distinct ground of challenge that survives even where the parent's own claim is hopeless. The Court of Appeal will permit re-amendment of Form 86 to raise this ground on appeal, notwithstanding the general rule against fresh attempts at leave.