By IANS
Bhopal : A woman in Madhya Pradesh pleaded before the state's Human Rights Commission to seek the release of her 65-year-old husband who was arrested by police two years ago for allegedly being a Pakistani citizen.
Shafaque Ahmed Siddiqui, alias Mansoor alias Shafahat, a tailor by profession who claimed to have designed the outfits of Rajesh Khanna and Shabana Azmi for the film "Avataar", was arrested on May 11, 2005 for living illegally in Bhopal when he went to a police station in a drunken state and screamed that he was a Pakistani.
Subsequently, a local court sentenced him to a one year imprisonment and a fine of Rs 1500. After completing his sentence he was imprisoned again in May 2006 by the Bajaria police, in Bhopal, on the pretext that he would be deported to Pakistan since he was a native of that country.
"We have written to the Pakistan embassy at least four times in the past one year but there has been no response. He would be deported to Pakistan after legal formalities. Till then he will have to remain in custody", said R.K. Malviya, the Bajaria police station in-charge.
Mansoor's wife Jamila, who teaches in an Indore school, claimed before the Human Rights Commission here Monday that her husband was an Indian and had wrongly said that he was a Pakistani as he was in an inebriate state. She said he was born in Meerut district of Uttar Pradesh.
"My husband should thus be released and allowed to live with me and his children", she stated in her appeal to the Commission.
However, police said, "Mansoor though born in Meerut, settled in Karachi at the time of the country's partition in 1947. Jamila is Mansoor's second wife and they have two children. His first wife, from whom he has six children, still lives in Karachi".
"Mansoor has told the police that he divorced his first wife in Karachi in 1989 and came to Bhopal on a tourist visa but never went back. He opened a tailoring shop in the Madhya Pradesh capital but later shifted to Indore, where he married Jamila. However, after a scuffle with her, he again came to Bhopal and started living in Bajaria area", said Malviya.