Love knows no borders...

Pakistani artist Masooma married Sumedh, a Keralite (pic: Outlook)

I recently read Ilmana Fasih’s post on how difficult it is for her to get a visa to India and how her soul shudders with fear when she has to fill up the visa form. Ilmana is an (ex)-Indian married to a Pakistani.
The link to her post had been sent to us by a reader probably as proof of how difficult it is for Pakistanis (even ex-Indians) to get a visa to India. Much as I hate to say this, the reverse is equally true too.
Indo-Pak marriages can be tricky in more ways than one and I admire those who take the plunge despite the many odds. I find cold-blooded comments, aimed at Indians married in Pakistan or Pakistanis married in India, asking women to accept their “fate” because they “chose” to marry a Pakistani or an Indian -- cruel.

This is what a reader had to say after reading about Ilmana: When you make a choice to become part of a country that actively harms your motherland you should accept the consequences with good grace. Instead you are whining that you are not getting special treatment because you went to a fancy medical school in Delhi or your parents are big professors in Delhi and so on. You mean to say that you are more exempt from scrutiny than an ordinary ill-educated Pakistani laborer? Obviously you do. At least you picked a proper feudal country to give your allegiance to.”

A comment on 80-year-old Zainab, who had an unfortunate marriage in Pakistan and wanted to return to India after her divorce: She is western educated and intelligent. So political naivety is inexcusable... India and Pakistan are like matter and anti-matter. Pakistan's existence is based on negative identity of India's failure. India, of course, can deal with an ideological aberration like Pakistan and move on since 'political India' existed for 1000s of years. So by discarding Indian citizenship and adopting Pakistani citizenship Zainab rejected the idea of India. Since Pakistan is an exhaustive negation of the idea of India she definitely deserves what she got and the only thing we can say is hard luck!

Varun met Wasiqa on a US campus (pic: Outlook)

Shortly after the much-publicised Sania-Shoaib marriage, who by virtue of being a celeb-couple gets a multiple-entry visa to each other's country, I spoke to two Pakistanis who married Indians despite being very aware of the difficulties involved -- which perhaps Zainab and Ilmana could not foresee decades ago. 

"Everyone in their right minds knows that an Indo-Pakistan marriage can be a logistical nightmare and wouldn't wish that for their child. It's a very strong political divide. Though for the couples concerned, the marriage and the move is a natural enough thing to do if you care for each other…for society at large it's an act of insanity," Sara (name changed) said.
Sara met her husband "whose parents are fairly liberal people with little information about or bias against Pakistanis" on a visit to India. Still it was not an easy decision. "My parents are originally from India, so it was too much of a reversal of history for them, that I would move back. They have 'explained away' India from their minds for psychological reasons and to hear of me moving back, of course, filled them with trepidation," she said.
Apart from Indian and Pakistani society not accepting such marriages and landlords refusing to rent out homes to such couples, it is always the wife who has to move to her spouse's country. "In all Indo-Pakistan marriages, the men, whether Indian or Pakistani, are the ones who have a harder time getting visas. So the women end up moving to the other country," she said.
However, having taken the plunge Sara sees her husband and herself as "cultural ambassadors". "Me marrying an Indian or him marrying a Pakistani is an act of courage and of huge historical relevance – much more important than any ministerial exchange, wouldn't you think?" she added.

Nida (name changed) who has made India her home, too, said: "I have set up my home and have great friends here. For three months at a time, I can forget that my status is temporary. But then at the end of three months, I have to pull out my ticket and passport and leave. On the other hand if I apply for a resident permit, I can't leave at all. Why should it have to be this or that?"
"I just want this (Indo-Pakistan relations) to become better. We function day-to-day with blinders on because it's too tough a situation to get bogged down by. But there has to be some letting go and relaxation," Nida said.

Cross-border marriages may be an act of insanity, still three cheers for those who are giving love a chance!