The District and Sessions Court South dismissed an application filed against Geeta’s ‘unlawful detention’ under Section 552.The court accepted Edhi lawyer’s argument that proper procedure should be adopted through the Foreign Office for Geeta’s return to her native country, India. An application had been filed by an Indian lawyer, Momin Malik, through Pakistani lawyers, under Section 552 of the criminal procedure code, which empowers the judge to compel restoration of abducted females. Legally the decision is a correct one, the applicant, a lawyer from India named Momin Malik, has no legal standing to file the case – he is neither family, nor is he authorised to act on behalf of the Indian authorities. With her Indian heritage still under question, the court correctly surmised that she cannot be handed over to veritable ‘strangers’. The application faced an uphill battle from the beginning; it chose to nominate Edhi Foundation as the respondents and sought a stay order against the charity to stop them from moving her to another location. Painting the well-respected charity, which has not only housed Geeta for the past 13 years, but houses over 5,000 children at its facilities as the ‘abductors’ was never going to win the application any favour with the judges.Pakistan and India regularly trade farmers and fishermen which unknowingly wander over to the other side of the border, and considering the popularity of the case, the Pakistani government would probably return Geeta, if the Indian High Commission approached it officially. While all the stakeholders wait for such a day, the need for a quick, dedicated and institutionalised method of repatriation of inadvertent trespassers is surely being felt on both sides of the border. Geeta, an Indian mute and deaf girl has been stranded in Pakistan for the last 13 years. She was handed over to the Edhi Foundation by the Punjab Rangers when she crossed the border by mistake.
pk.shafaqna.com
