Pakistan is a 'well of death', says Uzma after returning to India

Uzma Ahmed, the Indian woman who was allegedly forced to marry a Pakistani man at gunpoint during her visit there, called Pakistan a “well of death” while narrating her ordeal on her return on Thursday.

Describing Uzma Ahmad as “India’s daughter”, Swaraj welcomed her to India.

“I am sorry for all that you have gone through,” she tweeted.

Seated with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Indian Deputy High Commissioner in Islamabad J P Singh, and other senior ministry officials, an emotional Uzma said, “It’s easy to enter Pakistan but nearly impossible to leave that place.”

“Pakistan is a ‘maut ka kuan’ (well of death). I’ve seen women who go there after arranged marriages. They’re miserable and living in terrible condition. There are two, three, even four wives in every house,” she said.

Uzma said she wanted to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi to personally thank him for the government’s efforts to facilitate her return.

She said ‘Buner’, the area where Tahir, the Pakistani man who married her at gunpoint, took her after giving her sleeping pills, was like a “Taliban-controlled” region. 

Uzma Ahmed, the Indian woman who was allegedly forced to marry a Pakistani man at gunpoint during her visit there, called Pakistan a “well of death” while narrating her ordeal on her return on Thursday.

Uzma said had she stayed there for a few more days she would have been dead. She broke down several times while recalling the horror in front of the national media.

She profusely thanked Swaraj, Indian mission officials and other staffers for making her comfortable and ensuring her return.

Uzma, who is in her early 20s, hails from New Delhi. She was allowed by the Islamabad high court on Wednesday to return to India following a plea she filed with the court requesting its directive after her husband Tahir Ali took her immigration papers.

Accompanied by Indian mission officials and escorted by Pakistani police personnel, she crossed into India through the Wagah Border crossing near Amritsar.

She touched the ground after she entered the Indian territory.

Uzma had petitioned the 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.

Tahir had petitioned the court, requesting that he be allowed to meet “his wife”. A single bench of Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani heard both the pleas and after hearing their arguments, he allowed Uzma to return to India.

She has said she was forced to marry Tahir at gunpoint. The two reportedly met in Malaysia and fell in love.

Uzma reached Pakistan on May 1 and travelled to the remote Buner district in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province where she was married to Tahir on May 3.

Later she came to Islamabad and took refuge in the Indian high commission.

According to the law in Pakistan, her lawyer can continue to represent her in the case she has filed in the high court and she can return to pursue the case.

Swaraj thanks Pak establishment for Uzma’s return

Amid continued tensions with Pakistan, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj profusely thanked the Pakistani establishment and judiciary for facilitating Indian citizen Uzma Ahmed’s return.

She said though there is tension between the two neighbours, the Pakistan foreign office and the home ministry played a key role in her return.

Swaraj had words of praise for Uzma’s counsel Barrister Shahnawaz and Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kiyani of the Islamabad high court.

She said while the counsel treated Uzma as his child, the judge dealt with the case on humanitarian grounds and not through the prism of India-Pakistan relations as some people wanted him to.

“I heaved a sigh of relief as soon as she crossed the Wagah border,” Swaraj told reporters.