SRINAGAR: In a significant intervention underscoring humanitarian concerns amid national security operations, the High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh has ordered the return of a woman deported to Pakistan during the recent crackdown following the Pahalgam massacre. The woman, Rakshanda Rashid, had been residing in Jammu and Kashmir for years but was sent back after being deemed undocumented.
The direction came from Justice Rahul Bharti while hearing a writ petition (WP(C) No 1072/2025) filed by Rashid’s husband, Sheikh Zahoor Ahmed, challenging her deportation during the peak of Operation Sindoor, the government’s campaign against Pakistan in the aftermath of the Pahalgam massacre.
The Court, expressing deep concern over the woman’s health and humanitarian plight, ordered the Ministry of Home Affairs to retrieve Rashid from Pakistan within ten days and facilitate her return to Jammu for reunion with her husband.
“Human rights are the most sacrosanct component of a human life,” Justice Bharti observed in the order issued on June 6, adding that constitutional courts are often called upon to act with “SOS-like indulgence” in extraordinary situations, even before the legal merits of a case are fully adjudicated.
According to court records, Rashid had been living in Kashmir with her husband but lacked definitive nationality documents. She reportedly held a Long-Term Visa (LTV), which may have afforded her some legal protection. However, authorities deported her in a mass repatriation drive that critics claim failed to distinguish individual circumstances.
“She has no one in Pakistan for her care and custody,” her husband told the Court, describing her as gravely ill and abandoned in a country where she has no support.
The Court acknowledged that her LTV status might have made her ineligible for deportation without proper scrutiny. Yet, “without examining her case in better perspective and coming up with a proper order… she came to be forced out,” the order said.
Taking note of these “exceptional facts and circumstances,” the Court directed the Home Ministry to act without delay and to file a compliance report by July 1.
This High Court order marks the first judicial pushback against the sweeping deportation campaign that followed the Pahalgam violence, raising questions about the handling of women who had crossed over to Kashmir under the earlier cross-border rehabilitation policies and had since settled in the region.
Advocate Ms Himani Khajuria represented the petitioner, while Deputy Solicitor General Vishal Sharma represented the Union of India and other respondents.
The order may have implications for dozens of similarly placed women who were brought to Kashmir as brides under the now-defunct rehabilitation policy for ex-militants who returned from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. Many of them remain in limbo, having spent over a decade in the region without gaining citizenship or travel rights. -(KL)
