Daily Times

Maria Aleem, who hails from a Pashtun family, is going through the worst phase of her life as her husband Aleem is battling for life in a hospital and needs an urgent lung transplant.

Aleem, who hails from a Sindhi family, is a banker while his wife Maria is an academic. The two have been living a happy life since they tied the knot in 2014.

It was in February this year when the couple met the worst tragedy of their life after Aleem came to know that his both lungs were badly damaged and he needed an urgent transplant. The news of her husband suffering from a serious lungs disease was no less than a shock for Maria.

To add to her worries, she was told by medics that there was no such facility in Pakistan for the treatment of her husband’s disease.

“There isn’t any facility in Pakistan to cure the disease of your husband so you should wait for his last days as the treatment is very expensive in foreign countries,” Maria recalled what she was told by medics.

But Maria decided to defy all odds and started efforts for the treatment of her husband’s diseases. She goggled the hospitals conducting the lung transplant surgery and found two Indian hospitals – Global Hospital and Fortis Hospital in Chennai – offering the facility. She spoke to them and was told to get visa and arrange money for the recovery of Aleem.

“In April, I started a campaign on social media for donation and I am happy that I have received Rs 2.7 million from people across the world on humanitarian grounds, but some people in Pakistan doubt my intention and said that I am collecting funds for some other motives feigning my husband’s disease,” she told Daily Times.

“The other question, which really frustrated me, was people starting asking me where I would spend the amount if my husband dies before we get visa.”

“After collecting donations, I applied for Indian visas on June 1 but sadly they turned down my request.

I made a second attempt but met the same fate. I received a phone call from the Indian High Commission and was told that there was no need to make a second attempt as they had already rejected our visas. I informed them about my husband’s deteriorating health but they didn’t listen to my frail voice and disconnected the phone call.”

“Feeling broken inside, I sought Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swarja’s help on Twitter for issuance of visas but of no avail.

Moreover, socialites on both sides of the border started bullying me. Some of the Pakistan social media users said ‘I should not have sought visas from a country, which was killing our soldiers on the border’.”

She added, “I have nothing to do with the enmity of the two states. All I want is the treatment of my husband’s disease. The hostility between the two countries should not be at the cost of humanity.”

“Unfortunately, people on both sides of the border are paying the price of hostilities between the two states. This practice should come to an end now to facilitate the people on both sides,” former senator and human rights defender Afrasiab Khattak said when asked to comment on the issue.

“Both sides have been refusing issuance of visas even to patient for the past many years, which is against the humanity and United Nations Charter of Human Rights,” he said

Maria appealed to Pakistani authorities and Indian foreign minister to write letters to the Indian High Commission for issuance of visas.

“My family never fought a war with Indian or Pakistani soldiers but we are suffering from this so-called enmity.” Maria requested civil societies and human defenders on both side of the border to help save her husband’s life.

Several attempts were made for the response of the India High Commission in Islamabad for their version but they never replied.

Published in Daily Times, November 23^rd 2018.