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(ii) In order to fulfill his ambition of going abroad, the petitioner had applied for Passport on 11.03.2015. However, his application for issuance of Passport was not considered by the Passport Authority in view of the pendency of F.I.R. against the petitioner. Since the Passport Authority has refused to consider his application, the petitioner had approached the learned Judicial Magistrate, Valliyoor, seeking permission to go abroad and sought direction to the Passport officials to issue Passport to him. In response to the application submitted by the petitioner, the learned Judicial Magistrate, Valliyoor, passed an order, on 21.03.2018, directing the Passport Authority to issue Passport to the petitioner, subject to the condition that he shall not leave the country without obtaining prior permission from the Court. After obtaining orders from the learned Judicial Magistrate, Valliyoor, the petitioner approached the Passport Authority for issuance of Passport and finally, a Passport bearing No.S3497720 was issued to him. On receipt of the Passport, the petitioner found that the same was issued only for a period of one year i.e. from 27.06.2018 till 26.06.2019.

3. The learned counsel appearing for the petitioner would draw the attention of this Court to Section 6(2)(f) of the Passports Act, 1967, which is extracted hereunder:

"6. Refusal of passports, travel documents, etc.-
(1) ...
(2) Subject to the other provisions of this Act, the passport authority shall refuse to issue a passport or travel document for visiting any foreign country under clause (c) of sub-section (2) of Section 5 on any one or more of the following grounds, and on no other ground, namely:-

"6.Refusal of passports, travel documents etc (1).....

(2) Subject to the other provisions of this Act, the passport authority shall refuse to issue a passport or travel document for visiting any foreign country under clause (c) of sub-section (2) of Section 5 on any one or more of the following grounds, and on no other ground, namely

(a) & (b) ....

(c) that proceedings in respect of an offence alleged to have been committed by the applicant are pending before the criminal Court in India. It is well settled legal principle that mere pendency of FIR cannot be construed as pendency of criminal proceedings in respect of the offences alleged to have been committed by the applicant before the Criminal Court. Only after the Court takes cognizance of the offence alleged to have been committed by the applicant, as stipulated under Section 190 of Cr.PC., it can be construed as "proceedings pending before the Court".

"The judicial act commences only when the charge-sheet is in order and the Magistrate proceeds further under Chapter XVI. Unless the charge-sheet is in the official custody of the Court together with its accompaniments to be furnished to the accused, it cannot be construed that there is a filing of charge-sheet. Chapter XVI relates to commencement of proceedings before Magistrates, process to be issued when Magistrate takes cognizance of the offence."

Therefore, it is clear that unless the Judicial Magistrate takes cognizance of the offence, on filing of charge-sheet on completion of investigation against the applicant, it cannot be said that the proceedings are pending before the Criminal Court. Therefore, in my considered opinion, the 3rd respondent cannot mechanically refuse to issue passport to the petitioners, merely for the reasons that the FIRs are pending against the petitioners. On receipt of the application for passport, the 3rd respondent shall consider the same and pass appropriate orders.