Indian authorities on Wednesday released two jailed Pakistani nationals, Abdullah and Mohammed Imran Qureshi Warsi, through the Attari-Wagah border. Abdullah was detained from Attari in 2017 while Warsi spent 10 years in Bhopal jail on charges of “forgery and spying” after coming to India in 2004.
Warsi had gone to India to meet his Kolkata-based relatives. He stayed on for four years despite the expiry of his visa. Furthermore, he also got a ration card and a PAN card made during his stay. In fact, he was on his way to Bhopal to get a passport made when he was arrested by the police. The man, who has been freed after 14 years, told Indian media that he couldn’t be happier to see his mother, father and siblings who all reside in Karachi’s Gulshan Iqbal area. He has an Indian wife and two children from the marriage, whom he plans on taking to Pakistan through proper legal recourse.
The release of Pakistani nationals come in the wake of the release of Hamid Nehal Ansari, an Indian national who was detained and jailed in Pakistan for six years. He was repatriated to India after the completion of his prison term on December 15.
Ansari had illegally crossed into Pakistan from Afghanistan in 2012, and was convicted for spying and forging documents in December 2015.
He told court officials that he came to the country to see a girl he befriended on Facebook in the country’s north, according to his lawyer. But police were waiting for him at the woman’s house and arrested him on the spot. Ansari was released from the prison last Tuesday (Dec. 18) at 7.25am (0225 GMT) and returned India through an overland border crossing near Lahore.
Published in Daily Times, December 27th 2018.
