Spouse vis refused but Appeal allowed

[narmi82]

Hi,
I am wondering if someone can help/advice me on an issue. I am an Indian national with Permanent residency in UK. My wife was married previously to a person who was on a Tier2 visa in UK at the time. She has at the time applied for a visa to UK but was rejected due to lack of funds from her then sponsor. She later on got a divorced and we got married.

We got married in Jan 2013 and applied for my wife’s visa in May-2103. It got rejected in July-Aug 2013 as the ECO was not satisfied that my wife was free to marry (based on her previous marriage). We provided a marriage certificate from the court as well as a ‘Talaaq’ declaration from the previous husband, which is a legal document under Indian laws. The court in India will allow 2 adults to marry only if they are free to marry, i.e., adults are single or divorced.

We filed an appeal against the ECO’s decision. The hearing was earlier this month in the First-Tier Tribunal. At the hearing, the Presenting Officer (PO) from the Home Office agreed that the ECO has made an error in arriving at his decision and they have not followed their own guidelines in this matter. The hearing was over in 10 minutes as the PO didn't contest our arguments. Just for the records, I fought the case with help of a Barrister.

My question is, can I claim legal expenses that I incurred against the Home Office, given that their own PO has agreed that the decision was not in line with their own guidelines and an error was made? Could this be classified as a case of negligence/harassment? I am yet to get the actual judgement in writing but I was at the hearing as a sponsor. I have checked with my Barrister but he is not certain as it’s not his area of expertise.

Any suggestion/opinions would be greatly appreciated.