Pakistani woman Seema Haider has been in the news for illegally entering India through the Nepal border with her four children. The 27-year-old was arrested by the Gautam Budh Nagar police for illegally entering India on July 4. But she was later released on bail after a local court found that Haider entered India not with the wrong intention but to settle with her Indian partner.
It is not the first time a Pakistani woman has managed to sneak into India. In 2015, Pakistani woman Chanda Khan managed to travel for over 100 kilometres into India on the most scrutinised Samjhauta Express, the train which has been suspended since the abrogation of Section 370 from Kashmir in 2019.
Chanda Khan alias Fauzia had crossed the Attari border on the Samjhauta Express and travelled till Jalandhar in Punjab without any ticket or passport before she was arrested.
According to security agencies, after her arrest, Chanda Khan claimed that she came to India to visit ‘Dargahs’ and meet actors Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan. Chanda Khan could speak Punjabi, Urdu, and Hindi and claimed to be a resident of Karachi.
Chanda Khan, who claimed to be 27 then, had boarded the train from Wagah station in Pakistan on July 30, 2015. She had a bag that contained medicines and some Pakistani currency but no passport or visa.
It was the first Samjhauta Express that had returned with passengers from Pakistan after the terrorist attack on Dinnanagar police station in Gurdaspur district, Punjab, on July 27, 2015. The attack resulted in the deaths of four civilians and three policemen. Three terrorists were also killed in the encounter. The terror attack had created immediate tension between India and Pakistan.
Chanda Khan reached Attari, where all the passengers undergo customs and immigration clearance before moving further towards Delhi. However, Chanda Khan somehow skipped all the formalities and managed to continue her journey on the train. She came under scrutiny only when the train reached Jalandhar. Authorities never explained how she managed to skip the checks at the Attari station.
She was de-boarded at Jalandhar station around 10 pm when she could not produce a ticket, passport, or any other relevant documents. The Railways Protection Force had sought a special stoppage from the Ferozepur division to deboard her at Jalandhar, where she was arrested by the Government Railway Police. The Samjhauta Express had, otherwise, no halt at Jalandhar.
Soon after her arrest, the Pakistan High Commission approached the Ministry of External Affairs to get details about Chanda Khan.
In the absence of any separate barracks for women in custody, Chanda Khan was kept at a wireless room in the Ground Railways Police station at the Amritsar railway station during her police remand.
Chanda Khan was sentenced to two years imprisonment, and she was sent back to Pakistan in 2018 after completing her sentence.
“She was sentenced to two years. Chanda Khan was released and sent back to Pakistan via the Attari-Wagah road link in 2018,” said Navjot Kaur Chabba, a human rights activist, and lawyer who closely watches cases of Pakistani prisoners in Amritsar.
