90-year-old Indian girl revisits Pak after 75 years to see her ancestral residence in Rawalpindi
An Indian girl’s long-cherished dream of visiting her ancestral residence in Rawalpindi materialised when Pakistan granted 90-year-old Reena Chhibber Varma a visa and he or she arrived right here on Saturday by way of the Wagah-Attari border, 75 years after leaving the nation on the time of Partition.
Moist-eyed Varma, instantly after her arrival in Pakistan, left for her hometown Rawalpindi, the place she is going to go to her ancestral dwelling Prem Niwas, her faculty, and childhood buddies.
In a video she uploaded on social media, Varma, who’s from Pune, stated her household was dwelling on the Devi College Road in Rawalpindi when the Partition passed off.
“I studied at the Modern School. My four siblings had also gone to the same school. My brother and a sister also studied at the Gorden College located near the Modern School,” she recalled.
“My elder siblings had Muslim friends who would come to our home as my father was a man of progressive ideas and had no issue in meetings with boys and girls. Before the Partition, there was no such issue of Hindus and Muslims. This happened after the Partition,” she stated.
“Although the Partition of India was wrong, now that it has happened, both the countries should work together to ease visa restrictions for all of us,” she stated.
The Pakistan High Commission in India, in a goodwill gesture, has issued a three-month visa to Varma, who was solely 15 years outdated when her household moved to India through the Partition in 1947.
Varma had utilized for a Pakistani visa in 1965 however did not get it then as tensions between the 2 neighbours had been excessive due to the conflict.
The aged girl stated she had expressed her need to go to her ancestral residence on social media final 12 months.
Sajjad Haider, a Pakistani citizen, contacted her on social media and despatched her photographs of her residence in Rawalpindi.
Recently, she once more utilized for a Pakistani visa which was denied.
She then tagged her need to Pakistan’s Minister of State on Foreign Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar who facilitated her visa to go to her ancestral city.
