Wait for travel permit across LoC too long
Shariq Majeed
Tribune News Service

Poonch, May 6
Muhammad Iqbal (50) waited for two years for his relatives to come from Pakistan before marrying off his daughter Fozia Iqbal. It was only a few days back before Iqbal’s relatives arrived on the Poonch-Rawlakote trans-LoC bus from Rawalpindi that he solemnised the much-awaited wedding.

Two years back, Muhammad Iqbal of ward No 17 here decided to marry off his daughter Fozia (20) to Haroon Rasheed Rathore. However, since majority of his family elders here had already died, he thought the participation of his divided family members, who got separated from their family here in 1947 during Partition, living in Rawalpindi, was necessary to make the marriage a lifelong experience. He then asked his relatives, including his uncle Haji Saif-u-Din (65), his wife to apply for permit to travel to India for taking part in the marriage. Dying to participate in the marriage function of their relative’s daughter, they obliged and applied for the travel permit two years back.

For two years, Iqbal kept on calling his relatives to know the status of their permit, but every time they told him that the documents necessary for travelling to this country are “under process”. However recently, when he asked his relatives about the status, they gave a affirmative reply, saying that they have got the travel permit and would be travelling to India on April 21. Elated at the news, Iqbal then fixed the marriage date on April 23 and the marriage was in fact solemnised with the participation of 11 members of Iqbal’s relatives.

“Two years back when I finalised the match for my daughter and wished to marry her off, I thought the marriage ceremony would look incomplete without the participation of some elders. Since my father Nazir Ahmed is no more, I had a desire that my uncle Saif-u-Din, who lives in Rawalpindi after getting separated from our family in 1947 along with other relatives there should at least come for marriage,” said Muhammad Iqbal. “We waited for two years for them to get the travel permits. It was only after they got the permission for travelling to India that we fixed the date for marriage. I am happy that it was worth waiting for since I didn’t feel that there was something missing in the marriage,” he added.

However, Muhammad Iqbal says that two years is too long a period for a getting permit. “As India and Pakistan prepare for ministerial-level talks later this month, we appeal to the two countries to include the instant travel permits for marriage and emergency situations like deaths in their agenda,” he said. “The two governments should cut down the time in giving travel permission if they really want to come to the aid of the divided families.