Tanisha Rana
Published on: October 22, 2022 at 21:05 IST
On Friday, the Supreme Court permitted Mohd Qamar, 63, who was born in India in 1959 and moved to Pakistan with his mother when the two of them went to visit relatives, got stuck there due to the woman’s untimely death, and then returned with a Pakistani passport to be arrested, stayed in India to be released on bail because the Pakistani government refused to recognise him as a citizen.
Additional Solicitor General KM Nataraj was informed by a bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and Hima Kohli that he could not be treated as a “non-state person” because the Pakistani government does not recognise him as a citizen.
“We would accept his daughter’s application for Indian citizenship and hold him on bail because he is not viewed as a security danger by the Union or the UP government”, it said.
After serving a three-and-a-half year term for being found guilty by the Meerut Court of illegally residing in India, Qamar was released from Delhi’s Lampur Detention Centre in April of this year on a Supreme Court order.
He had been held there since 2015 under the Aliens Act.
The court ruled that Qamar may be looking for some rescuers to get free bail at this advanced age because he is not a security threat, is married to an Indian, and has five children who are all Indians.
This is especially true given that the High Pakistan Committee failed to confirm his Pakistani citizenship despite granting consular access twice.
Qamar, who was born in 1959 to Indian parents in Meerut, travelled to Pakistan with her mother when she was eight years old to see family in the Shalami neighbourhood of Lahore. Unfortunately, his mother passed away prior to the visa’s expiration, thus he was left in his mother’s relatives care.
He acquired a Pakistani passport as an adult and travelled to India in 1989 and 1990. He married Sehnaaj Begum of Meerut soon after arriving in India, and over the next six years they produced five children—three boys and two girls—together.
His daughter Sanjay Parikh informed the court that despite the fact that his visa had long since expired, the illiterate man never bothered to renew it.
Due to his continued residency in India after the expiration of his visa, he was detained on August 8, 2011, in accordance with the Aliens Act.
He received a three years and six months sentence after the Meerut court ruled him guilty.
Ana Parveen, Qamar’s daughter, petitioned the Supreme Court to grant her father’s release on bail on the grounds that he had conveyed to the Delhi High Court and the authorities his wish to apply for Indian citizenship and live with him and his family in Meerut.
She said that both his wife and children had Aadhaar cards.