Muhammad Nabi, 70, went missing from Delhi airport on Monday afternoon. PHOTO COURTESY: FAMILY
A 70-year-old Pakistani who went to Delhi to meet his relatives earlier this week has gone missing, claimed his family.
Elderly Muhammad Nabi, who hails from Karachi, travelled to Delhi by PK-272 on Monday afternoon. After clearing immigration, the man stepped out from the airport but was nowhere to be found by his nephews and grandchildren, who came to the airport to receive him.
A missing report has been lodged at a police station near the Indira Gandhi International Airport by his relatives. Speaking to The Express Tribune from Delhi, Muhammad Aziz said the police have yet to find the whereabouts of his uncle. “We are very worried as we have no idea who took him and where he is.”
The Indian police have showed Aziz CCTV footage of the area outside the airport and it clearly shows an unidentified man gesturing Muhammad Nabi to step behind a bus. “We don’t know if he got on the bus or went somewhere else,” said a worried Aziz. “He doesn’t know anyone here except us.”
Since the family lives in Muradabad, it took them some time to reach the airport and locate the gates. “We had told our uncle to wait for us and call us when he gets here,” Aziz recalled. “But neither did we receive a phone call from him nor did we find him waiting.” Here in Karachi, Muhammad Nabi’s only child, Meena Aisha is frantically reaching out to the authorities and activists for help. “My father is old,” she cried at her house in New Karachi. “He is innocent and has no enmity with anyone.” According to her, this was her father’s third visit to India.
Muhammad Nabi had previously visited the country in the 1970s. He is a retired government employee, she added. “He wanted to meet his nephews and offer prayers at his brother’s grave as he died 10 years ago,” she explained, adding that Muhammad Nabi was scheduled to return home within a month.
Aisha, who condemned her father’s disappearance, demanded her father be recovered immediately and urged the Pakistani government to take up this matter with the Indians, and make sure that he is safe and sound. Meanwhile, social activist Ansar Burney, who is also looking into the matter, told The Express Tribune that he has written a letter to India’s home department on the missing resident.
“We have expressed our concern over the disappearance of the elderly man,” said Burney, who added that over the years, Pakistanis go missing in India and then after months they are found languishing in jails across India.
If Muhammad Nabi has committed any crime then the Indian authorities should come forth and declared it, he said, adding that they shouldn’t stay quiet on the disappearance. The Indian officials have yet to get back to him on the matter, he added.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 6th, 2013.
COMMENTS (48)
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@Vishnu Dutta: I ve said it before and I ll say it again... Pakistanis have higher standards for workplaces...India is not one of them...we find better paying jobs in Pakistan.
@Andalusian: since you decided to start 'scoring' with dead bodies I guess - the one who initiates is the one to be blamed.
I suppose it never crossed anyone's mind among the rabidly anti-Indian Pakistanis here that he was an old man who could have simply wandered off to the wrong place or been duped/misled by any unscrupulous person? People do that to foreigners and vulnerable Indians alike at the Delhi airport offering taxi services and other transport and hotel options - we have to wade through a horde of such people and ignore them since we know the game. Probably this gentleman didn't and got taken in - there was a few years ago case where a foreign tourist was told by a thug that there were riots in Delhi and if he wanted to be safe he should go along with this particular fellow and he would put him up at a 'safe' hotel which turned out to be one he had a tie up with in a seedy part of the city and it was some days before the poor tourist got to know the truth. That seems more likely than anything and the culture in Pakistan being no different, one would think the people here would have thought of this likelihood, yet there are SO MANY comments on such an article as if it's a huge conspiracy by India to start kidnapping old Pakistani travelers since we have nothing better to do and no more effective ways to show our animosity for you folk.
What job a 70 year person has in India. This news has been given undue space in ET,perhaps he is a relative of some big man in ET. @The Khan- Waterloo, Ontario:
@Javelin: Absolutely thay are better off in India. On this very site, a number of times karachites are advised to go back to India. Abul Kalam Azad knew best
@Naveen: Yes and this 70 year great grandfather fits the typical profile...doesn't it. Incredible India!
@Someone: "All disadvantaged Indian Muslims should leave India." How come there is no rush to get to Pakistan? They are thanking their lucky stars that their parents opted to stay with India.
From his picture it seems the gentleman is perhaps inflicted with the early stages of the Alzheimer's disease. As a result, he might have wandered away unnoticed. He shouldn't have been allowed to travel alone. But I am supremely confident that with the help of a good Samaritan, he will be found safe and healthy as he is reunited with his extended family in India.
Sometime I wonder though, would they Inform the reader if the missing person was found??
Anyways I pray for the missing person. I am sure people go missing in Pakistan too so please don't treat it with some conspiracy theory. I am sure he will be found.
@ABKhan: They are your brother and sisters who didn't go to Pakistan at the time of Partition.
A 70 year old man comes , since after 1970 and then steps into a bus . Why didn't any relative come with him ? Why should Indian gov find him ?Even if Delhi police finds him , then put that old man behind bars , for keeping all in dark.
@Andalusian: How do you know he is not an ISI stooge who just disappeared in India ? Or may be he is just fed up with load shedding and bombings in Pakistan at this age and just want to spend rest of his days in peace?
@Vishnu Dutta: Hey, i know situation is bad in Pakistan but its not that bad for Pakistani labor to actually migrate to India. Maybe you're confusing Dubai, Saudi with Bharat?
I don't know exactly news but think is that pakistani terrorists are not allowed in INDIA, to all pakistanis please don't come to India to create terrorist. why you people not go to China? why not creating terrorism over China.
I have no doubt that my country India will throw all its weight behind trying to locate this man...it could be a case of personal enmity...i would request pakistanis to not jump to conclusions too soon...A lot of pakistanis we see are here in India for better career opportunities...nothing has been going wrong with any of them...Indian law authorities are far more effective than the ones in pakistan, so its not similar to how it happens in pakistan where once gone missing, a person is usually found dead...there is no indian taliban version or no indian version of jihad which exists...
How come this news item is not covered in Indian media ? Except ET, I don't see any other paper covering this news. May be the gentleman not recognizing his nephews , went with someone else ... I am sure He must have gone back to the right place. Any follow up from the relatives ?
@Vishnu Dutta: Believe it or not but there are entire localities of mini pakistan in big cities in India. You can find tons of them there.
That's the name Indians give to Muslim enclaves. Says much about the plight of your Muslims. All disadvantaged Indian Muslims should leave India.
@AAK:"What a joke some body made on this page, ideally I will not stop calling it Non sense. People from Pakistanis looking for job in Indian cities. A country who is struggling to cope with hunger & poverty people lying in foot path with nothing to wear and eat." You are so damn right Sir, we in India have not a morsel of food, not a piece of cloth to cover our bodies, no jobs etc etc etc...:) And despite all this..we dont run to foreign countries with begging bowls asking one country to help make dams, asking other to fund your education system, asking the third to give you hard cash..... we may be desperately poor, but we are definitely not beggars:)
I hope he is found soon and returned to his family . Please do not read politics or enmity into it, just looks like criminal activity .
The vitriol in the comments made by Pakistani friends, is to say the least, not surprising at all.From their comments one feels that hawk eyed Indian agents were waiting to pounce on an old man. Our prayers and with the old man and his family.He will be traced soon. For all those posting what I call, foolhardy comments here, please go get a life.
@Prabhjyot Singh Madan: exactly! well said man..
@Vishnu Dutta: I think you're confusing India with the UK or something...
He has to be found. Indian government is not a bunch of thugs. He is just another foreigner visiting us. Don't jump to conclusions , he is not Zardari or anybody just a human like millions of our Indian Muslims brothers and sisters , bibi etc. He will be found by our authorities, we don't want pakistani govt harassing us for a old man. Rab rakha
@Zara: "So sad that this is what the enimity of the countries has come to." +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ So Painfully True. here is a 70 year old man with family on both sides of the border. In one sense that typifies what India and Pakistan are: one family across the two sides of the border.
I am sure he will be soon reunited with his Indian and then his Pakistani Family.
@Vishnu Dutta: find work? are you serious my friend?
What a joke some body made on this page, ideally I will not stop calling it Non sense. People from Pakistanis looking for job in Indian cities. A country who is struggling to cope with hunger & poverty people lying in foot path with nothing to wear and eat.
@abdussamad: What you say may well be the case, but still we must find him and hand him over safely to his family.
@Vishnu Dutta: “Too many pakistani citizens breach their visa conditions and go in hiding and stay with their family or find a work.” You are very funny dude, Joke of the Millenium... I'm Still Laughing....
Our (Indian) responsibility; he should be found and handed over to his family. No excuse for such a case.
@ABKhan:
Believe it or not but there are entire localities of mini pakistan in big cities in India. You can find tons of them there.
@Aarvey, India:
"As low as Pakistan got with Sarabjit Singh, no more, no less."
Perhaps you had moral authority to said that if you had not killed a Pakistani prisoner in return. As long as you kill someone its fine, but you can still blame others for it.
@Vishnu Dutta:
"Too many pakistani citizens breach their visa conditions and go in hiding and stay with their family or find a work."
Yes your assumptions look so legit, that I will say in future whoever from India will disappear in Pakistan would be hiding. I have so many Pakistanis here in ET condemning anything bad happens in Pakistan but perhaps Indians lack that skill like many others too!!!
I am sure so many people are desperate to work in sweat factories of India or in the construction of multistory "Jhonpar patti", oh did I forget the great livelihood source of collecting money from infinite number of people who are sleeping on footpath???
My prayers with the concerned Families ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Hopefully there will be good news soon on this account.
@js: So you justify this?
@Aarvey, India: In India, two Pakistani prisoners were killed soon after Sarabjit died, so you didn't just get even, you've outscored us.
check nia,ib,ai,raw headquarters
Part of the risk of going to an enemy country.
@Vishnu Dutta:
What a comment! Atlesast the comment should have some context of the above report. Do you think a 70 year old is going to India for getting a job... Please consider the gravity of the law and order situation in the Indian capital not just focus on Pakistan bashing....
Why do Pakistanis want to visit India, after so much has happened, why cant you understand that we are enemies and you must not go behind enemy lines. God bless, stay on your side and be safe.
Oh yes it can't be that the senile old man just wandered off. No, it has to be giant conspiracy to kidnap old Pakistanis.
Nobody knew the man. He is no vip so how can he just go and meet a stranger. Delhi authorities should help find him. No conspiracy theories please.
As low as Pakistan got with Sarabjit Singh, no more, no less.
So sad that this is what the enimity of the countries has come to. It sounds like a case of abduction if the man was asked to step behind a bus, although I don't want to jump to conclusions. My prayers are with his daughter and his family. May Allah keep him safe and may he return home soon, Insha'Allah. I can't imagine what the family must be going through. I would go crazy with anxiety if this had happened to my family members. And such an old man, too.
I hope the Pakistani goverment does more than just "condemn the disappearence". To me it seems like that is all they ever do.
Insha'Allah hope to read of his return soon.
One reason why we should not let children or the elderly travel vast distances unaccompanied
Not the first one and wont be the last one. Too many pakistani citizens breach their visa conditions and go in hiding and stay with their family or find a work. Its all illegal and one of the reason why Indian govt doesnt want to relax visa conditions.
There are so many unsubstantiated assumptions in this article that it seems like a prime case of 'how not to report a matter'. All you had to report was that an aged Pakistani has been reported as missing in Delhi by his relatives.
This do not happens with the Indian Nationals when they arrive at any airport in Pakistan. It is the responsibility of the Indian Government to find out about the whereabouts of the missing person and produce him before the court so that he should narrate the whole story as who was the person or agency who kidnapped him after reaching Dehli Airport.
Incredible India!
How low can you go?
(Post my comment ET, even if it's offensive, it's the inconvenient truth).