India assures assistance for Ramzan's return to Pakistan

Indian foreign minister says she is sending an official to Pakistan tomorrow to facilitate Ramzan's return

Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj assured on Monday an official would be sent to Pakistan to facilitate the return of Karachi’s ‘runaway boy’.

"I am going to send our official to Pakistan tomorrow to facilitate Ramzan's return to his homeland," Swaraj told reporters, after meeting the teenager who has been stranded in India for over two years.



Ramzan, 15, was separated from his mother at the age of 10 when his father took him to Bangladesh and remarried. After being tortured by his stepmother, the boy crossed the border alone in 2011 with the hope of coming back to his mother in Pakistan.

Addressing the media at her official residence, where Ramzan was also present, Swaraj said she is set to meet Geeta, the deaf and mute Indian girl who recently returned to from Pakistan after a decade.

"I am going to meet Geeta in Indore tomorrow," the India foreign minister said.



Ramzan is currently staying at a shelter home 'Umeed' run by an NGO 'Aarambh'.

Ramzan had traveled to many states before landing in Bhopal where he was spotted at the railway station by the government railway police (GRP) on September 22, 2013, and shifted to a shelter home run by Childline. Ramzan has remained there since.

In September this year, a CA student from Bhopal traced the boy’s family in Karachi by sharing pictures via social media.



Ramzan’s mother, Razia Begum, after learning that her son is in India, contacted Pakistani human rights activist Ansar Burney with a request for his release and return. She also uploaded a video appealing to the Indian government to send her son home. Burney had mailed a copy of the passports of Ramzan’s grandparents to the Indian embassy and Childline for help to no avail until Geeta safely returned back to India.

This article originally appeared on The Economic Times.