Guwahati, Jan 7: The Assam police said a 36-year-old woman and her son, who went missing from Nagaon district of Assam in November 2022, have been traced to a jail in Pakistan.

Wahida Begum and her 10-year-old son were detained and later lodged in a Pakistan jail for illegally entering the country.

Talking to media persons, Nagaon superintendent of police, Leena Doley, said, “The woman was duped and taken to Saudi Arabia first on the pretext of marriage using forged documents and then to Pakistan. She got widowed two years ago, sold off her property and left Nagaon in November with a man she had met recently and had promised to marry her.”

“They came to know about her whereabouts last month when the woman’s mother received a letter from a law firm in Pakistan informing her that her daughter and grandson were lodged in the district jail of Quetta in Pakistan’s Baluchistan. The woman’s mother later lodged a police case and also received a call from her daughter confirming her location,” the SP said.

The SP further said, “It appears she and her son along with the man, who took her from Nagaon to Saudi Arabia, were arrested in Pakistan when they tried to enter the country using fake documents.”

The woman’s mother filed a petition in the Delhi High Court and also wrote to President Droupadi Murmu seeking the repatriation of her daughter and grandson.

On Friday, the High Court dismissed her petition saying it was not within its jurisdiction. It asked her to approach the Gauhati High Court.

The petitioner Azifa Khatun had sought urgent government intervention in the matter on humanitarian ground to secure their release.