‘Baseless’: J&K police deny deportation of Shaurya Chakra awardee’s mother to Pakistan

“Reports circulating on social media regarding the alleged repatriation of the mother of Shaheed Constable Mudasir Ahmad are false, baseless, and categorically denied,” the Baramulla Police said in a statement, adding that no such action had been taken against Shameema Akhtar, the mother of the slain constable, who has lived for 45 years in India according to her relatives.

Akhtar’s son Nasir Maqsood told The Indian Express that while her name was on the list of deportees, they have now been informed by the police that her deportation has been put on hold.

“The SHO of our area came to our house in the evening stating that her name was amongst the list of people that have been asked to leave but I have been informed today that her deportation has been put on hold,” Nasir Maqsood, who is in Uri, told The Indian Express.

“My brother made the supreme sacrifice for the country, how can my mother be asked to leave,” he questioned. He said an initial notice included her name. “This is under process and she’s in Srinagar right now,” he said.

According to Mohammad Younus Sheikh, Maqsood’s younger brother in Srinagar, 65-year-old Shamima Begum “was taken from her home,” in Uri on Monday. “Her father left for Pakistan during partition. He then married there and after his wife passed away, he came back with his daughter. He is also buried here,” he said.

Mudasir Ahmad Shaikh was a member of an undercover unit of the Jammu and Kashmir Police that intercepted a group of terrorists in May 2022. He was posthumously awarded the Shaurya Chakra and his mother had accepted the award on his behalf from President Droupadi Murmu in May 2023, accompanied by her husband, retired police officer Mohammad Maqsood.

The government’s ongoing deportation drive follows a spate of policy measures in response to the recent terror attack in Pahalgam that killed 25 tourists and one local resident. The Centre has suspended the Indus Waters Treaty, downgraded diplomatic ties with Pakistan, and ordered all Pakistani nationals on short-term visas to leave India by April 27.

Authorities have confirmed that 60 individuals—mainly wives and children of former militants who returned under the 2010 rehabilitation policy—have been identified for deportation. These individuals were picked up from multiple districts including Srinagar (36), Baramulla (9), Kupwara (9), Budgam (4), and Shopian (2), and were moved to Punjab to be handed over at the Wagah border.

(With inputs from Naveed Iqbal in Jammu and Kashmir)