Sweetheart across the salt desert: Indian boy-Pak girl love story runs into borders

In a classic love story separated by borders, a 20-year old youth from Maharashtra on way to meet his sweetheart in Pakistan was apprehended by Border Security Forces close to the India-Pakistan border in Kutch, Gujarat

According to reports, Siddiqui Mohammad Zishan was spotted by BSF on Thursday about 1.5 km from the India-Pakistan International Border.

When asked where he was heading to, Zishan said he was on his way to meet a girl in Karachi he was madly in love with.

Zishan identified the girl as Samra from Shah Faisal town in Karachi Pakistan.  

He claimed to have come in contact and developed affinity for Samra through WhatsApp and Facebook.

BSF troopers who apprehended Zishan, as per reports, said he wanted to go to Pakistan to be with Samra and was using GoogleMaps for navigation.

“He was prevented from crossing the border after the Maharashtra Police Crime Branch shared his details with the Gujarat Police after Zishan’s parents lodged a missing person complaint. Officials at Balasar police station in Gujarat’s Kutch district shared the information with BSF troops,” the report added.

The boy’s mobile tracking system led BSF jawans to his location near Dhoiavira. A search was conducted in the area and led to the discovery of a black-coloured Bajaj Boxer motorcycle with a Maharashtra number near Fossil Park. It was identified as Zishan’s bike and led jawans to the location of this 20-year-old from Maharashtra’s Osmanabad.

At the time he was found by BSF, Zishan was in a dehydrated state and revealed that he had been unconscious for about two hours in the Rann of Kutch. A PAN card, Aadhaar, ATM card and mobile were recovered from his possession. The matter is being probed further by security agencies.

Had he not been rescued in time, Zishan’s fate could be similar to another boy from Maharashtra who spent six years in a Pakistani jail for entering the country illegally in 2012. Hamid Ansari fell in love with a girl he befriended on Facebook and managed to cross over to Pakistan to be with her. He was finally released from prison in 2018.