Nepalese 'son' given hope to stay in UK

WILL BENNETT

A Nepalese teenager who was rescued from a life of poverty and brought to Britain by a wealthy businessman should be allowed to stay on humanitarian grounds, an immigration appeal tribunal recommended yesterday.

The final decision on whether Jayaram Khadka will be allowed to continue living in a Gloucestershire commune with Richard Morley, who regards him as his son, now rests with the Home Secretary.

"I will never abandon my son, wherever he goes, I go," said Mr Morley, 41, the leader of a commune at Clearwell Castle, a neo-Gothic manor house in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire, who is said to have made a pounds 2.5m fortune from a computer consultancy.

Mr Morley told the tribunal how Mr Khadka's father saved his life by trekking for three days to get help when Mr Morley's lung collapsed in the Himalayas 11 years ago.

Mr Khadka senior asked Mr Morley to look after his son in the event of his death. Four years later, he died and in 1990 Mr Morley returned to Nepal, where he found the son in squalor. He brought him back to England, but the boy only had a visitor's visa.

In November, the tribunal dismissed his appeal against deportation but sat again last month to see whether there were any exceptional factors involved. It decided that deportation would be too traumatic.