JOIN USPak man, 2 women found illegally staying in B'luru
Three Pakistani nationals, including two women, have been arrested by police in Bengaluru for illegally staying in India for the past nine months. A man from Kerala, who married one of the women, is accused of facilitating the Pakistanis’ illegal entry and stay in India.
The Pakistanis have been identified as Sameera (26), Kiran Ghulam Ali (25) and Kashif Shamsuddin (30), all from Karachi. Kiran is married to Kashif while Sameera is the wife of Mohammad Shihab (30), a native of Palakkad, Kerala.
The four were arrested from a two-bedroom house in Kumaraswamy Layout, south Bengaluru, on Wednesday night. Bengaluru Police Commissioner, Praveen Sood, announced the arrests on Thursday.
Here’s how and why the Pakistanis, along with the Kerala man, reached India.
In 2012, Shihab went to Qatar to work as an office assistant in a company. His father, who was working as a driver there, helped him get the job. Shihab fell in love with Sameera whose residence was just behind his workplace. One day, Shihab met Sameera’s parents and asked her hand in marriage. They turned him away, saying they didn’t want their daughter to marry an Indian.
Subsequently, Sameera’s two brothers learnt that she had become pregnant and had a miscarriage. They thrashed Shihab and took her back to Karachi. But Sameera was too committed to the relationship to give it a silent burial. She, with the help of her cousin Kiran, stayed in touch with Shihab over phone. Kiran, who was living in Qatar at the time, had her own love story. She was dating her cousin, Kashif, but their parents opposed the alliance.
The two couples realised that the only way out for them was to flee to another country and settle there. Shihab suggested that India was a good option. Accordingly, Sameera and Kashif flew to Qatar and joined Kiran and Shihab. Travelling in a group ensured that the unmarried couples could evade scrutiny in conservative West Asian countries.
From Qatar, the four travelled to Muscat, Oman, and thence flew to Kathmandu, Nepal. Thereafter, they travelled by road to Patna, Bihar, through the porous Indo-Nepal border. In Patna, they took a train to Bengaluru. This was in September 2016.
Once in Bengaluru, the Pakistanis started living like Indian citizens. Kashif landed a job with a perfume factory in Kumaraswamy Layout. He had past experience in Qatar. Shihab, however, chose to stay at home to take care of his pregnant wife. Kiran, too, stayed at home. The Pakistanis managed to procure Aadhaar cards for themselves under fake identities.
“Preliminary investigation shows that they decided to settle in India after their parents’ objected to their marriage. We are verifying their claim and are not convinced about it. We are investigating the case with the help of the Intelligence Bureau and other agencies. We have kept the central agencies in the loop,” Sood said.
The homicide and burglary squad of the Central Crime Branch (CCB) received a tip-off on Monday night about the Pakistanis illegally staying in the city. The three possessed Pakistani passports. They have been booked under several sections of the Passport Act and the Foreigners Act while Shihab faces charges of conspiracy and abetment.