AMRITSAR: Lovelorn Fiza Khan, a 24-year-old teacher from Rewa, Madhya Pradesh, couldn’t cross the international border at Attari to meet her Pakistani friend Dilshad whom she had met over social media. She was ‘held’ at the Attari border post and handed over to the Madhya Pradesh police.
Despite having a valid visa and travel documents, the woman was stopped at Integrated Check Post (ICP), Attari, due to a Lookout Circular (LOC) issued against her and was handed over to police by the immigration officials, who on Saturday handed her over to a police party from MP.
According to police sources, Fiza Khan had met Karachi resident Dilshad online and both of them decided to marry. Fiza made up her mind to travel to Pakistan and got a Pak visa and other travel documents too.
Police inspector Agyapal Singh informed that on June 16, Fiza went to school but didn’t return, following which her family members lodged a missing complaint at Rewa city police station. Since Fiza had already discussed traveling to Pakistan, in the apprehension that she would cross the border, a look-out circular was issued against her. On June 23, the young woman reached Amritsar and went to Attari international border on her way to Karachi but was held at the ICP due to the LOC. Immigration officials at ICP, Attari, informed about her to the Gharinda police station who recorded her statement and sent her to Nari Niketan, and this information was given to Rewa police.
On Saturday, she was handed over to a police team from Rewa, led by police inspector Saurav Kumar Soni.
There have been earlier instances where women have met Pakistani men online and then gone to marry them. On April 12, 2019, Kiran Bala, mother of three, resident of Garshankar in Punjab's Hoshiarpur district had gone to celebrate Baisakhi with a Sikh jatha but upon reaching there she married a Lahore-based man, Muhammad Azam, whom she had met on social media.
A year before that a Bathinda woman, named Tina Sharma, had befriended a Gujranwala man, Muhammad Suleman while playing an online game and she crossed over to Pakistan and married Suleman on October 24, 2018.
