Dumb, nameless, boy awaits freedom

The police are sympathetic to the boy’s plight. ‘‘He has to be pushed back and we are waiting for a nod from the Centre,’’ a senior police officer said. ‘‘We have written dozens of letters but somehow there is no response.’’ He acknowledged that the boy was innocent. ‘‘We know he has crossed over by mistake and it is painful for us as well to keep him here,’’ he said.

The boy can barely hear and can’t speak at all, except for one word — ‘‘Amma, Amma (mother, mother).’’ He cannot explain who he is or where he is from. The only information the other inmates have managed to get from him is that his home is somewhere in Lepa Valley across the border.

‘‘When he was brought here, he used to weep for hours and point towards the mountains, saying ‘‘Amma Amma,’’ the police officer said. ‘‘Perhaps, he wants to convey that he wishes to go back to his mother,’’ says the police officer.

This boy, however, is not the only Pakistani prisoner in jail. Thirty-year-old Sadiq Hussain Shah is from mohalla Khas of Chucha village in Tehsil Balakote in Pakistan. ‘‘His story is equally sad,’’ says the police officer. ‘‘He was a bus conductor and the bus had a tyre pucture on a road near the international border,’’ a senior police officer said.

‘‘While attending to this problem, he crossed the line even without realising it. He was arrested and then sent here.’’ The officer said he too was languishing at the JIC for almost two years. ‘‘We have no doubt that he too crossed over by mistake and we have already written to the Government for pushing him back,’’ he said.

According to the officials, the two Pakistanis have not received any letters from home. ‘‘Their families perhaps believe they are dead,’’ an officer said. And, in fact, Pakistan has never taken up their case with the authorities. ‘‘We were expecting their release at the time of the Agra summit too. But somehow it didn’t happen. The recent thaw in relations with Pakistan have certainly raised our hopes.’’ The JIC at Srinagar is not a jail but an interrogation centre. However, officials say, it is being treated as a sub-jail. A heavily guarded building in the foothills of Zabarwan, right next to the Kashmir VIP enclave, it once housed the stables of the Dogra kings of Jammu and Kashmir.