A married Indian woman has travelled to Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province to meet her friend whom she befriended and fell in love with on Facebook, police said on Sunday.
Anju, 34, was born in Kailor village in Uttar Pradesh and lived in the Alwar district of Rajasthan. She is now in the Upper Dir district of Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to meet her 29-year-old Pakistani friend Nasrulla.
Nasrullah, who works in the medical field, and Anju became friends on the social media platform Facebook a few months ago, ARY News reported.
Anju is visiting Pakistan for a month and has not come here to marry him, The Indian woman was initially in the custody of the police but was released after her travel documents were verified by the district police.
"She was allowed to go after all the travel documents were found to be in order. They were provided security to ensure no untoward incident takes place which can bring a bad name to the country," a source told PTI.
An officer at Dir police station said Anju and her friend were released after her documents were cleared by senior police officer Mushtaq Khab and Scouts Major.
A team of Rajasthan police reached the home of Anju in Bhiwadi to enquire about her after media reports.
Her husband Arvind told police that she left home on Thursday on the pretext of going to Jaipur, but the family later came to know that she was in Pakistan.
"She left home saying she has to meet her friend. I talked to her on WhatsApp a few days ago and got to know that she was in Lahore," Arvind told police.
He said they were married in 2007 and have been living together since then.
"Anju's husband said that she left home on Thursday. She had a valid passport," Assistant Superintendent of Police Bhiwadi Sujit Shankar told PTI.
He said that the family has not given any complaint regarding the matter.
The couple works in private firms in Bhiwadi and has a 15-year-old girl and a six-year-old son.
Arvind told the media at his home that his wife told her sister that she was in Lahore and later he also spoke to her.
He said he will talk to her and will ask her to return, asserting that he was hopeful that she would return home.
He said her passport was issued in 2020 as she wanted to apply for a job abroad.
Arvind said he had no idea that she was in touch with anyone on social media.
A senior UP police official said on Sunday Anju was born in Kailor village in Jalaun district located in the Bundelkhand region of Uttar Pradesh but has nothing to do with the village.
Kailor is located around 70 kilometres from the district headquarters in the Madhavgarh development block of Jalaun district.
"At the time of issuing of passport, a person has to mention his/her place of birth. Apart from the place of birth, everything pertains to Rajasthan. The passport was made in Delhi, and the Kailor village of Jalaun district has nothing to do with it," Superintendent of Police Iraj Raja told PTI.
There are striking similarities between the stories of Anju and Seema Ghulam Haider, a Pakistani mother of four, who sneaked into India to live with Sachin Meena, a Hindu man she got in touch with while playing PUBG in 2019.
However, unlike Seema who entered India without a visa via Nepal with her four children all aged below seven years, Anju has travelled to Pakistan legally from India via the Wagah-Attari border.
Seema, 30, and Sachin, 22, live in the Rabupura area of Greater Noida, near Delhi, where he runs a provision store, according to Uttar Pradesh Police.
On July 4, Seema was arrested by local police for entering India illegally and Meena was held for sheltering illegal immigrants. However, they both were granted bail by a local court on July 7 and have been living together along with her four children in a house in Rabupura.
Seema has written to President Droupadadi Murmu to grant her Indian citizenship.
The two incidents have occurred at a time when the bilateral relations between India and Pakistan are nearly frozen over the Kashmir issue and cross-border terrorism emanating from Pakistan.