Tribunal decisions

The decision

IN THE UPPER TRIBUNAL
IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM CHAMBER
Case No: UI-2025-001979

First-tier Tribunal No: PA/03058/2024
PA/66777/2023

THE IMMIGRATION ACTS

Decision & Reasons Issued:
On 12 January 2026

Before

UPPER TRIBUNAL JUDGE KAMARA

Between

GB
(ANONYMITY ORDER MADE)
Appellant
and

Secretary of State for the Home Department
Respondent

Representation:
For the Appellant: Mr R Hussain, solicitor, Legal Justice Solicitors
For the Respondent: Mr A Mullen, Senior Home Office Presenting Officer

Heard at Field House on 22 October 2025

Order Regarding Anonymity

Pursuant to rule 14 of the Tribunal Procedure (Upper Tribunal) Rules 2008, the appellant is granted anonymity. No-one shall publish or reveal any information, including the name or address of the appellant, likely to lead members of the public to identify the appellant. Failure to comply with this order could amount to a contempt of court.

DECISION AND REASONS
Introduction
1. The appellant has been granted permission to appeal the decision of a First-tier Tribunal Judge who dismissed his appeal following a hearing which took place on 10 February 2025.
Anonymity
2. I have continued the anonymity order made by the First-Tier Tribunal. I have considered the public interest in open justice, but conclude that it is outweighed by the importance of facilitating the discharge of the United Kingdom’s obligations to those claiming international protection because of the need for confidentiality.
Factual Background
3. The appellant claims that he and his wife, who is dependent on his claim, are nationals of Afghanistan and that they are at risk of persecution owing to their Sikh faith and their refusal to become Muslims. That claim was refused by the Secretary of State in a decision dated 19 December 2023, principally on the basis that fingerprint checks revealed that the appellant was an Indian national who had applied for an Irish visa in 2019 and that when interviewed, the principal appellant knew little about Afghanistan, provided evidence inconsistent with external information and could only speak Indian Punjabi and not speak any of the languages spoken in Afghanistan.
The decision of the First-tier Tribunal
4. Following the hearing before the First-tier Tribunal, the judge dismissed the appeal for similar but more expansive reasons to those provided by the respondent. In addition, the judge found the evidence of the witnesses who were said to be relatives, to be unreliable.
The appeal to the Upper Tribunal
5. In the grounds it is argued that the judge erred in the assessment of the language spoken by the appellant. It is asserted in the grounds that the appellant spoke Kabli Punjabi and the judge erred in finding that the appellant did not speak a language spoken in Afghanistan. It is further argued that the judge erred in stating that the appellant and his wife had Indian passports when no copies of passports had been provided by the respondent. Lastly, it is said that the judge erred in attaching no weight to the appellant’s evidence.
6. Permission to appeal was granted on the basis sought, with the judge granting permission making the following remarks.
It is difficult at times to follow the Judge’s reasoning, and It is arguable that the Judge’s findings in relation to the appellant’s nationality are contradictory and unclear, particularly in relation to the language spoken by the appellant.
Furthermore, it is arguable that the Judge failed to provide adequately reasoned or sufficiently clear findings for rejecting the oral evidence provided by the appellant and his witnesses.
7. The respondent filed no Rule 24 response.
The error of law hearing
8. The matter comes before the Upper Tribunal to determine whether the decision contains an error of law and, if it is so concluded, to either re-make the decision or remit the appeal to the First-tier Tribunal to do so. A bundle was submitted by the appellant containing, inter alia, the core documents in the appeal, including the appellant’s and respondent’s bundles before the First-tier Tribunal.
9. The hearing was attended by representatives for both parties as above. Both representatives made submissions and the conclusions below reflect those arguments and submissions where necessary.
Discussion
10. The main plank of Mr Hussein’s submissions was the alleged failure of the judge to determine whether the appellant spoke Kabli or Afghan Punjabi, which is spoken in Afghanistan. The sole evidence supporting the appellant’s claim to speak Afghan Punjabi is his witness statement dated 28 November 2024. The appellant was interviewed in standard Punjabi for his screening interview and there is no record of the appellant having requested an Afghan Punjabi interpreter to support his belated claim that he did so. Indeed at 1.10 he was asked to identify his main language and dialect and he replied Punjabi. The appellant replied, no, to the question at 1.11 what other languages and dialects do you speak. At 2.6 of the screening interview the appellant states that he is uneducated and learned Punjabi at the temple. For his substantive asylum interview, the appellant was interviewed using a Punjabi, Indian interpreter and reported no difficulties with communication. Even the appellant’s witness statement fails to record the language used to read it to him (given that he claims not to be literate) before he signed it as a true and accurate document.
11. The above-mentioned extracts from the evidence were considered by the judge at [31] as part of his overall findings as to the appellant’s nationality along with the fact, recorded by the judge at [17], that the appellant and his witnesses all gave their evidence with the assistance of a Punjabi interpreter. While the judge did not directly refer to the appellant’s unsupported claim that he could in fact speak an Afghan dialect of Punjabi, it is apparent from [37] that the judge found that the appellant spoke Punjabi and that, if the appellant’s claimed account was an honest one, it would be consistent with both being an Afghan Sikh and an Indian national. In short, the judge did not take the appellant’s inability to speak an Afghan language or dialect as a decisive factor. At [13], the judge records the claim that the appellant speaks the Afghan Punjabi dialect and it is therefore evident that the judge did not overlook this matter. It follows that even if the judge ought to have said more about the appellant’s belated claim to speak Afghan Punjabi, there was no material error owing to the judge’s overall findings on the language issue.
12. The second matter argued by Mr Hussein related to the reference by the judge to the appellants having had Indian passports which were used in the Irish visa applications. Mr Hussein argued that the judge erred in this finding because these documents had never been provided by the respondent. This ground misstates the judge’s findings. The judge’s finding as to the existence of passports is based upon his acceptance that the visa application forms showed the appellant’s correct identity and nationality as well as that of his wife. The visa application forms were produced and the judge was entitled to place weight on that evidence, which was obtained owing to a fingerprint check.
13. The said forms provided the passport details for the appellant and his wife. None of that evidence was in dispute. The judge therefore made no error in extrapolating his findings on the visa applications to conclude at [105] that the appellants, in reality, possessed passports with which they could voluntarily depart from the United Kingdom.
14. Lastly, Mr Hussein criticised the judge for finding the appellant’s witnesses to be unreliable in the absence of any submission from the respondent that they were either not related or their evidence was not credible. I should add that Mr Mullen disputed Mr Hussein’s account of the respondent’s view of the witnesses’ evidence. Neither side had requested the transcript of the hearing and no contemporaneous notes or minutes of the hearing of the hearing were available. The judge has set out none of the parties’ submissions and was entitled to take that approach, all the more given the length of the decision which runs to 112 paragraphs. It is therefore not possible to conclude that the judge made adverse findings which he was not invited to make. Indeed at [95], the judge records that it was as a result of the respondent’s questions that ‘key inconsistencies’ were revealed in relation to the appellant’s alleged relationship with a witness who it was claimed was his sister. That finding does not suggest that the respondent accepted the credibility of the witnesses’ evidence. Otherwise, the grounds do not engage with the thorough reasons given by the judge for rejecting the reliability of the witnesses at [91-99].

Notice of Decision
The making of the decision of the First-tier Tribunal did not involve the making of an error on a point of law.
The decision of the First-tier Tribunal shall stand.

T Kamara

Judge of the Upper Tribunal
Immigration and Asylum Chamber

22 October 2025

NOTIFICATION OF APPEAL RIGHTS

1. A person seeking permission to appeal against this decision must make a written application to the Upper Tribunal. Any such application must be received by the Upper Tribunal within the appropriate period after this decision was sent to the person making the application. The appropriate period varies, as follows, according to the location of the individual and the way in which the Upper Tribunal’s decision was sent:

2. Where the person who appealed to the First-tier Tribunal is in the United Kingdom at the time that the application for permission to appeal is made, and is not in detention under the Immigration Acts, the appropriate period is 12 working days (10 working days, if the notice of decision is sent electronically).

3. Where the person making the application is in detention under the Immigration Acts, the appropriate period is 7 working days (5 working days, if the notice of decision is sent electronically).

4. Where the person who appealed to the First-tier Tribunal is outside the United Kingdom at the time that the application for permission to appeal is made, the appropriate period is 38 days (10 working days, if the notice of decision is sent electronically).

5. A “working day” means any day except a Saturday or a Sunday, Christmas Day, Good Friday or a bank holiday.

6. The date when the decision is “sent’ is that appearing on the covering letter or covering email