A scientist conducting groundbreaking research into renewable energy is facing deportation with his family to Sri Lanka, where he was tortured, after receiving contradictory information about his case from the British Home Office.
Nadarajah Muhunthan, 47, his wife, Sharmila, 42, and their three children, aged 13, nine and five, went to the UK in 2018 after Muhunthan, who is working on thin-film photovoltaic devices used to generate solar power, was given a prestigious Commonwealth Rutherford fellowship.
The award allowed him to reside to the UK for two years to research and develop the technology. His wife obtained a job caring for elderly people in a nursing home.
Photo: Reuters
The family members are Tamils, a group that has experienced persecution in Sri Lanka.
In November 2019, Muhunthan returned to his home country for a short visit to see his sick mother. While there, he was arrested and persecuted by the Sri Lankan government. He managed to escape and returned to the UK, where he claimed asylum on the basis of what he had experienced in Sri Lanka.
After his scholarship expired in February last year, neither he nor his wife were permitted to continue working.
A Home Office case worker sent an e-mail on Sept. 20 saying that the family’s asylum claim was “under active consideration,” and another e-mail on Oct. 11 saying that the claim had been refused on Aug. 23 — four weeks before the family had been told their case was still under consideration.
The family had been renting accommodation in Bristol, and all the children were settled at school there. The Home Office moved the family from their rented accommodation in Bristol to a London hotel last month, uprooting all three children from school.
When Muhunthan’s scholarship visa expired, the nursing home manager begged the Home Office to allow Sharmila to continue working.
“We are in dire need of trained healthcare staff and we urge you to consider Mrs. Sharmila Muhunthan’s right to work for us as a matter of urgency,” her manager wrote.
The request was refused.
A year after lodging his claim, Muhunthan was given permission by the Home Office to work because his area of expertise was listed as a shortage occupation.
However, not having UK residency has deterred potential employers.
“This looks like a wholly avoidable situation which has been caused by UK visas and immigration working too slowly,” British Home Secretary Priti Patel wrote in a letter to the family’s member of parliament, John Penrose, on Oct. 1.
The family’s lawyer, Naga Kandiah, said that the UN has highlighted concerns about Sri Lanka’s “surveillance, intimidation and judicial harassment” of journalists and academics, among others.
“All asylum and human rights claims will be carefully considered on their individual merits,” a Home Office spokesperson said.
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