Sushma Swaraj thanks Pak for return of Indian woman

New Delhi: External affairs minister Sushma Swaraj profusely thanked the Pakistan government and judiciary for their role in enabling Uzma Ahmed, an Indian nation, to return to India on Thursday.

“Pakistan’s foreign ministry and home ministry helped us,” Ms Swaraj said. “Uzma — Welcome home India’s daughter. I am sorry for all that you have gone through,” Ms Swaraj tweeted hours after Ms Ahmed, in an emotional gesture, bent down and touched Indian soil after crossing the Wagah border in Amritsar.

Ms Swaraj also praised Ms Ahmed’s counsel, barrister Shahnawaz Noon, and Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani of the Islamabad high court for her return.

Ms Swaraj, accompanied by Ms Ahmed and Indian deputy high commissioner to Pakistan J.P. Singh, told the media, “I heaved a sigh of relief as soon as she crossed the Wagah border.”  

Ms Ahmed profusely thanked Ms Swaraj and Mr Singh for their support. Still shaken from her experience, she described Pakistan as a “well of death” and narrated how she was lured to Pakistan by a Pakistani national, Tahir Ali — whom she had initially met in Malaysia — and was then forced to marry him by signing the Nikahnama (marriage certificate). She accused him of administering sleeping pills, without her consent.

Ms Swaraj “thanked” Ms Ahmed for “trusting” the Indian diplomatic mission and told reporters that she had also suffered beatings.

Ms Ahmed said that while some Indian Muslims may think favourably of Pakistan as a “nice” place, women are not safe there. “Even men there are not safe, what to talk of women,” she said, fighting tears.

Ms Ahmed is reportedly in her early 20s and hails from New Delhi. She described herself as an orphan while thanking her uncle and aunt. She has a daughter, Falak. She expressed her wish to meet PM Narendra Modi to personally thank him for the Indian government’s efforts.

Ms Swaraj said that Ms Ahmed’s counsel, Shahnawaz Noon, had treated her as his child, and Judge Kayani had dealt with the case on humanitarian grounds and not through the prism of India-Pakistan relations.

She pointed out that Tahir had exhorted the judge to treat the case as one of Pakistan’s prestige, but the judge had maintained that it had nothing to do with Indo-Pak ties.

Ms Swaraj’s words of praise for the Pakistani civilian government raised some eyebrows, coming as they did at a time when ties between India and Pakistan are strained over LoC incursions and the Kulbhushan Jadhav case. But they also made clear that while India would be firm and respond in kind to any move to foment trouble, New Delhi will generously appreciate Pakistan’s genuine efforts to help, especially in humanitarian matters. Ms Swaraj said that New Delhi would stand behind all its citizens abroad whenever they are in crisis, irrespective of religion or region.

Ms Ahmed said the place where she stayed with Tahir — Buner, in Pakistan’s tribal Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province — was a “strange place with strange people”.  

She said that in Buner, which was once under Taliban rule, every man had four to five wives and keeps guns and pistols in their homes. She also indicated that many other foreign women had been enslaved there, with no hope of escaping. She recalled how easy it was to get a visa to visit Pakistan, but often impossible to leave the country as per one’s will. “I kept hearing the sound of firing (of guns),” she said.

The Indian high commission had sheltered Ms Ahm-ed and promised her that they would not hand her over to Tahir. Ms Swaraj revealed how Ms Ahmed had even contemplated suicide in case she was handed over to her “husband”.

Mr Singh told reporters that it was a “life and death” situation for Ms Ahmed and that the high commission was ready to offer shelter to her for two years or more. On Wednesday, Ms Ahmed was allowed by the Islamabad high court to return to India following a plea that her husband, Tahir Ali, had taken her immigration papers.

According to news agency reports from Pakistan, Ms Ahmed had petitioned the Pakistani court on May 12 requesting it to allow her to return home urgently as her daughter from her first marriage in India suffered from thalassemia — a blood disorder characterised by abnormal haemoglobin production.

Her “husband” Tahir had petitioned the court, requesting that he be allowed to meet “his wife”. Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani heard both the pleas and after hearing their arguments, allowed Ms Ahmed to return to India.