‘What did the children do?

Indian visa crackdown against Pakistan tears families apart

- NAMITA SINGH

Sara Khan cradles her two-week-old baby in the sweltering summer heat of northern India, switching between comforting him and wiping her own tears. Dressed in a salwar-kurta and plastic slippers, she has journeyed almost 360km 223 miles) overnight to reach the border after the Narendra Modi government abruptly revoked her visa and ordered her to leave.

“I am 33 years old and my son, just 14 days,” Khan says, holding her newborn close before crossing the Attari-Wagah border post in Punjab. “We were not even given time to seek a court stay. I got the call at 3am. I have been travelling since.”

Khan is one of hundreds of Pakistani nationals directed to leave India this week after a terror attack in Pahalgam, a tourist town in the restive Himalayan territory of Kashmir, left 26 people dead, most of them Hindu visitors. As bilateral ties suffered, New Delhi suspended all visas issued to Pakistani nationals, including long-term spousal permits.

Pakistani women staying on long-term spousal visas with their families in Jammu and Kashmir were rounded up by police in a sweeping midnight raid. On 30 April, the government allowed women married to Indian citizens to stay, but by then, many, like Khan, had already been brought to Attari.

“My long-term visa was valid till 2026,” Khan, who married an Indian citizen in Jammu and Kashmir’s Rajouri eight years ago, says. “But now they are saying it’s no longer valid since the Pahalgam attack. All I ask is to be allowed to stay with my family. My older son is six years old and a Pakistani national. My baby was born by caesarean section. He doesn’t even have a name yet. He has no papers. How can I leave my breastfeeding child behind?”