Agencies
Rajouri, Jan 24: Nearly a month after he was murdered in Saudi Arabia, the body of Rajouri man, Mohammad Khalil Mirza, was flown to his native village at the behest of Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).
The poor family expressed gratitude to the MEA for making all arrangements to bring the body back and also thanked for highlighting the issue.
The body reached home at around 10:00 a.m. on Thursday, Mohammad Akram, maternal uncle of the deceased said, adding that the flight due to poor visibility could not land at Jammu airport yesterday and had returned back to Delhi. “We hired a private vehicle and today morning we reached home.”
The body reached home in a very short period of time, the family said for which they said: “We are highly thankful to MEA,” Mohd Akram. “We are also thankful for highlighting the issue.”
“We have spend Rs 50000 from New Delhi to home town Rajouri and we urge administration and government of Jammu and Kashmir to compensate the expenses as are very poor,” the family said.
The 44-year-old man from Rajouri district of Jammu division was killed after being hit with some sharp object in Saudi Arabia, his family said.
Having no means to bring the body back home, they had issued an appeal to the government of India through Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to see that the body was brought to Rajouri for last rites. “Mohammad Khalil Mirza (44) son of Haji Mohammad Azam Mirza of Malhut, Darhal, Rajouri was killed after being hit by some persons with a sharp object at Amaan area of Riyadh where he was working as a labourer,” Mohammad Amin Mirza, brother of the deceased said.
He said that the family lost contact with Khalil on December 22 last and despite best efforts, the family was unable to find his whereabouts.
“Few days back a person from Pakistan administered Kashmir called us and informed that Khalil Mirza’s body is lying in a mortuary and he his body was found with an injury in his head,” Amin said.
Soon after getting the information, they had issued the appeal to the MEA.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Kashmir Monitor staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
