Mumbai, Nov. 11 -- A Cyprus-based marine engineer, originally a resident of Nerul in Navi Mumbai, has approached the Bombay High Court, saying the renewal of his passport is held up due to two seven-year-old criminal cases against him. If the passport is not renewed before his Alien Registration Card (ARC) or work visa in Cyprus expires on November 23, he risks the ignominy of being deported, the petitioner, 59-year-old Brahma Mall, has said in his plea. Mall's petition seeks a direction to the magistrate court in Andheri, where his application seeking permission for passport renewal is pending, to decide his plea urgently. If he is deported on account of an immigration lapse, he would "face immense hardship" in vacating his rented house and closing contractual obligations, the petition says. Mall, a project manager at a shipping company in Cyprus, is accused of cheating, criminal breach of trust and other offences, based on private complaints by Proactive Crewing and Offshore Services and Advent Marine and Shipping Services before the magistrate. While the cases were registered in 2018, no summons have been issued to him so far and inquires into the cases have also been rejected by the magistrate, said Mall's lawyer Swapana Kode. In his plea before the high court filed in September, Mall says that he had secured a police clearance for his Cyprus work visa in 2022 without any issues. The alleged cases from 2018 had not even surfaced then, he said. He learnt about the cases from the Nerul police station tasked with verification of his passport. At the time of renewing his ARC, he needs to have a passport with a six-month validity, Mall says in his plea. Since his passport expires in May 2026 and renewal would take at least a month, he applied for the same in July, when he also submitted his old passport. He learnt about the pending criminal proceedings on July 22, at the police verification stage of his passport renewal by the Indian Embassy in Nicosia. He then approached the magistrate court in Andheri, where the criminal cases were pending, seeking permission to renew his passport. Though his application was listed for hearing on 12 occasions between August 25 and September 29, he was not granted any relief, his petition in the high court says. Mall's plea is likely to be heard by the high court on Tuesday. While Mall's case may be peculiar, the high court last month came to the rescue of 76-year-old Sharad Khatu, whose passport renewal was held up as online records showed a criminal offence was pending against him since 1990. When Khatu applied for renewal of his passport on November 31, 2022, he was informed that a criminal offence against him was pending at the MRA Marg Police Station. Khatu made inquiries about the case at the police station, the magistrate court at Ballard Pier, and under the RTI Act. All of these showed that there was no criminal offence pending against him. He then moved the high court seeking relief. The passport authorities and the state government both told the court that no offence was pending against Khatu. On October 14, the court directed the authorities to process Khatu's passport renewal application afresh and swiftly. The court also asked them to delete the incorrect entry in their record that showed an offence against Khatu....