WHEN IS A WIFE NOT A WIFE?

Fifth marriage sparks challenge on residency

Surjeet Singh Nahal, 56, lives in Alberta. He has had five wives, all from India. Immigration authorities know him well.

The first wife sponsored him into Canada as a permanent resident, and he later became a citizen. The second he sponsored, then promptly divorced after a few months. The third he tried to sponsor, but was refused because it appeared to be a “marriage of convenience,” designed to game the immigration system. The fourth he sponsored, stayed married for several years, then divorced.

Number five was the really tricky one. Now, after reviewing his convoluted marital history and the various immigration cases it has spawned, the Federal Court of Canada has ruled that his current marriage is also a sham, and so his wife cannot have permanent residency.

The case offers a window into the delicate legal practice of evaluating not just a marriage, but also familiarity, closeness, even sexual habits.

There is no appeal. As a result, Nahal’s new wife and daughter are likely to make a compassionate humanitarian application to remain in their home in Edmonton, according to their lawyer Richard Kurland. Otherwise, they will have to leave Canada.

Gurpreet Kaur, 34, is a citizen of India who entered Canada as a temporary foreign worker in 2013, on a permit that expired last year. Now she is a homemaker and mother.

She had known Nahal since 2008, but only met in person in 2012, while he was still married to his fourth wife, court records show. In 2014, when he was separated, they began living together, and they married a month after his divorce was finalized in 2015.

A month after that, she applied for permanent residency. In 2016, she gave birth to their daughter.

Last year, her application was refused, on the grounds that she had failed to establish, on a balance of probabilities, that their marriage is genuine and was not entered into primarily for immigration purposes.

“There are concerns regarding the sponsor’s immigration history as he has a pattern of sponsoring Indian nationals under the family class category and filing federal court appeals on previous officers’ refusals,” an immigration officer decided.

The officer also noted Nahal had cheated on his previous wives, and his divorce decisions indicate they were based partly on grounds of adultery, mental cruelty, and financial disputes.

“The thing is that people change, and young men do wild and crazy things, but over the last almost 20 years, there were just two marriages, one of 12 years and one of 7-8 years. And he only has had one child in his lifetime and that’s the one with this lady (Kaur),” Kurland said. “It’s really different. At first blush, it appears like a serial marriage, and always looking to bring people into Canada. But if you’re married to someone for 12 years, come on …”

The officer’s decision, which was based on interviews and has now been upheld by the federal court, reveals several grounds for suspicion. Nahal did not know when his wife entered Canada, or where in India she was from (although this appears to be a confusion over proper place names). Kaur did not know where in India her husband was from or his shift work schedule in Edmonton. And though both were generally aware of the other’s personal circumstances, there were discrepancies in their accounts of when they met, when they started living together, their most recent vacation, their honeymoon, and their most recent sexual encounter.

The officer noted that Nahal would try to answer questions for his wife, and thought their body language was not reflective of a genuine marriage.

In her application for judicial review, Kaur argued the officer was unreasonable and acted in bad faith.

For example, she claimed the officer said one child is not proof of a real marriage, but two would be. The court found this quote was taken out of context, and was simply the officer’s way of saying that all factors, including children, must be considered in the proper context.

In law, an immigration officer can judge the authenticity of a marriage based on such things as the length of the relationship before marriage; compatibility in terms of age, interests and finances; how they communicate; how well they know each other, and previous marriages.

“I would respectfully add to that list the number of previous spousal sponsorship applications, and when and why those marriages were terminated,” wrote Mr. Justice Richard Bell of the Federal Court of Canada.

PEOPLE CHANGE, AND YOUNG MEN DO WILD, CRAZY THINGS.