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| Muslim sons searching their Sikh mother-daughter since 50 years vv | | | Jammu, Oct 1
Two Pakistani Muslim brothers, searching for their Indian Sikh mother and sister since five decades, have appealed to the Indian people to help locate them.
Iftikhar Ahmed Khan (55), hailing from village Patika Shaikan in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK), who works' as Assistant Director Public Relation Development Authority, has appealed to Indian authorities and people of Jammu and Kashmir and Uttaranchal to help him find his mother and sister.
''My mother Shamima Akhtar (Indian name Aatam Kaur, 80) and sister (Jigendar Kaur, 49 year old) are probably living in Jammu or Dehra Dun in Uttaranchal,'' he said.
He also sent letters and photographs to Sanjay Sharma, a local resident, whose family had also migrated in 1948 from Muzaffarabad to Jammu. Mr Sharma has also been searching them since last one year.
Iftikhar, son of a Sikh mother and Muslim father, has been trying to come to India since past one year to search for his mother and sister but could not get permission as Pakistani government has imposed a ban on government employees visiting India.
''The 1947 Partition divided our family between two countries,'' he told UNI over phone from PoK.
''I have also written a letter to the concerned government in this regard requesting authorities to help me to search my mother and sister,'' said Iftikhar Ahmed.
During the violence and riots in 1947, Aatam Kaur was separated from her parents who reached Jammu but she was left behind in Muzaffarabad where she got married to a Muslim youth named Mohammad Ayub Khan. Converting to Islam, she was renamed Shamim Akhter. She gave birth to two sons, Iftakhar and Ijaz.
In 1955, when India and Pakistan signed an agreement to recover the lost women and children in each other's territory, she was located by her parents and was brought back to India by her father with the help of the official machinery. However, her husband and sons were left behind. She was already seven month pregnant and gave birth to a baby girl, after two months in Jammu.
Due to her parents' conservative attitudes and resistance, she could never return to her husband in PoK. Unable to forget her husband, in 1958, Aatam sent him a letter, along with a photo of her with her daughter.
This photo, which is now in the possession of the brothers, is the only link through which the two brothers hope to find their lost mother and sister.
''We have longed for the last fifty years to see our mother and sister. Now with the opening of routes along the Line of Control, a hope has been build. We would be grateful if anybody could pass on any information or clue which unites us with our loved ones,'' said Mr Akhtar, who has approached a number of people on this side of Line-of-Control for locating his family members, in an appeal. |
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