UP man arrested for crossing Pakistan border illegally to meet online lover

Aligarh (The Uttam Hindu): A 30-year-old man from Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, has been arrested in Pakistan for illegally crossing the border to meet a woman he fell in love with after befriending her on Facebook. The man, identified as Badal Babu, a resident of Nagla Khatkari village was apprehended by Pakistan's Punjab Police in Mandi Bahauddin city.

According to Pakistani authorities, Babu admitted during interrogation that he had developed a romantic relationship with the woman on social media and eager to meet her in person, crossed into Pakistan without a valid visa or travel documents. He was arrested on December 27 after failing to produce any travel documentation. Babu has been charged under Sections 13 and 14 of Pakistan's Foreigners Act, 1946 and was later presented in court. The court remanded him to judicial custody for 14 days and he is scheduled to appear again on January 10, 2025.

Initial investigations revealed that Babu had attempted to cross the India-Pakistan border twice before but was unsuccessful. On his third attempt, he managed to enter Pakistan and reach Mandi Bahauddin where he met the woman he had been communicating with online. Authorities are now investigating whether Babu’s illegal entry was solely motivated by his romantic relationship or if there were other factors involved. This is not the first time an Indian man has tried to cross the border to meet his partner in Pakistan. In a similar incident in July this year, a man from Uttar Pradesh attempted to cross the border to marry a Pakistani woman he had met online. However, his attempt was thwarted by Border Security Force (BSF) personnel, who detained him at the Khokhar border outpost in Jammu and Kashmir before handing him over to the police after a preliminary investigation.