LAHORE: The Lahore-born Pakistani singer Adnan Sami, who has now been granted Indian citizenship, is among half a dozen renowned personalities who had migrated temporarily to Pakistan at some stage but had somehow opted to work and live permanently in India owing to various reasons, an exclusive research conducted by the “Jang Group and Geo Television” Network reveals.
But before we go on to name and discuss those celebrated personalities of the Indo-Pak Subcontinent who had preferred India to Pakistan, let us first briefly peek into the chronology of Adnan Sami’s long efforts to gain Indian nationality and the life/professional career of his distinguished father Arshad Sami Khan:
Having first arrived in India on March 13, 2001 on a visit visa with the validity of one year, Adnan submitted a representation to the Indian Home Ministry on May 26, 2015, whereby requesting his stay in India on humanitarian grounds.
Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi had given a favourable opinion to the Ministry of Home Affairs in this regard.
(References: Rediff.com, the Times of India, The Hindu and the India Today etc)
Various other Indian and Pakistani media houses reported that in November 2015, Pakistan had refused to confirm renunciation of nationality by Adnan Sami over his alleged disrespectful behaviour towards his national identity.
His Pakistani passport (issued on May 27, 2010 and expired on May 26, 2015) was not reportedly renewed by the Pakistan government, which forced him to approach the Indian government with the request to legalise his stay in India on humanitarian grounds.
Adnan is the son of Squadron Leader (R) Arshad Sami Khan (1942-2009), who was a fighter pilot-turned-Grade-22 Federal Secretary-turned diplomat, who had served three Pakistani Presidents (Ayub Khan, Yahya Khan and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto) as their Aide-de-Camp (ADC) and Chief of Protocol to Ghulam Ishaq Khan, Farooq Leghari, Benazir Bhutto, Waseem Sajjad, Nawaz Sharif and Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi.
Arshad Sami Khan was decorated with Sitara-e-Jurat award, Pakistan’s third highest military medal of honour for bravery during the 1965 Pak-India war for flying the maximum combat missions from Peshawar, he was the youngest recipient of the prestigious “Best Fighter Pilot’s Trophy” and was awarded the “Sitara-e-Imtiaz” (posthumously).
After retiring from the Air Force in 1972, he served as ambassador of Pakistan to 14 countries including Estonia, Sweden, Denmark, Norway etc.
Archives show that while the then Pakistan Air Chief Marshal, Rao Qamar Suleman, had expressed great sorrow and grief over Arshad Sami’s demise due to pancreatic cancer at the Kokilaben-Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital in Mumbai, Prime Minister of the time Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani visited his residence in June 2011 to offer his condolences with Arshad’s widow Naureen Sami Khan and second son Junaid Sami Khan.
His book titled “Three presidents and an Aide,” which was released in India in March 2008, was launched by former Indian prime minister I K Gujral. His family said since no publisher in Pakistan was ready to publish the best-selling book that was actually an eye-witness account of historical events taking place during the reigns of three Pakistani presidents, they had to opt for its launch in India.
Archives of numerous leading Pakistani newspapers and television channels also reveal Arshad Sami’s burial ceremony had taken place in Islamabad with profound Military honours including a 21-gun salute.
Now, here follows the brief list of known Indo-Pak personalities, who did migrate to Pakistan for some time, but had decided to work and live permanently in India:
Jogendra Nath Mandal (1904-1968), who was Pakistan’s first minister of Law and Labour between August 15, 1947 and October 8, 1950, and the second minister of Commonwealth and Kashmir Affairs between October 1, 1949 and October 8, 1950, had migrated to India a few years after partition.
He had submitted his resignation to Liaquat Ali Khan citing, the then prime minister of Pakistan, citing ant-Hindu bias of the then Pakistani administration.
From 1947 to 1950, the Bengal-born Mandal lived in Karachi, which became Pakistan’s capital after partition.
Interestingly, he had held the Indian citizenship from 1904 to 1947, and Pakistani nationality from 1947 to 1968.
The first paragraph of Jogendra Nath Mandal’s resignation, addressed to then Pakistani prime minister and dated October 8, 1950 had read: “My dear Prime Minister: It is with a heavy heart and a sense of utter frustration at the failure of my lifelong mission to uplift the backward Hindu masses of East Bengal that I feel compelled to tender resignation of my membership of your cabinet. It is proper that I should set forth in detail the reasons which have prompted me to take this decision at this important juncture of the Indo-Pakistani Subcontinent.”
The Aligarh-born influential Indian novelist, short story writer and an academic, Qurratulain Hyder (1927-2007), moved to Pakistan along with her family members in 1947.
Her first novel “Aag ka Darya” was first published in Urdu from Lahore in 1959.
She then moved to England, but opted to return to India, instead of Pakistan, in 1960.
She lived in Bombay for nearly 20 years before shifting to Noida near New Delhi, where she had been staying till her demise.
Qurratulain Hyder was the daughter of writer and pioneers of Urdu short story writer, Sajjad Haidar Yildarim (1880–1943).
Her death was condoled by the president and prime minister of India, and Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh.
The tall and well built Pakistani classical singer, Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan (1902-1968), was a scion of the noted Patiala Gharana of music.
He had moved to the Indian city of Banaras (now Varanasi) at the age of 21 to find a career.
Born in Kasur, which is also the hometown of Madam Noor Jehan, Ghulam Ali Khan came back to Pakistan after the 1947 partition, but had returned to reside permanently in India.
He was granted Indian citizenship in 1957 with the help of the then Bombay chief minister Morarji Desai, who became India’s prime minister years later. He was given a government-maintained bungalow at Malabar Hill, an up-market hillock in southern Mumbai.
Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan was awarded the “Sangeet Natak Akademi Award” and the prestigious Indian award “Padma Bhushan” in 1962.
He had spent the final years of life at Indian Hyderabad’s Basheer Bagh Palace, which was constructed by Sir Asman Jah, the state’s prime minister.
Gifted Urdu poet and Bollywood lyricist, Abdul Hayee (1921-1980), popularly known as Sahir Ludhianvi, settled in Lahore in 1943, where he had completed “Talkhiyaan” (Bitterness), his first published work in Urdu.
In 1949, arrest warrants were issued for promoting Communism and the Ludhiana-born Sahir had to flee Lahore to Delhi to seek refuge. After just eight weeks, Sahir had moved on to Bombay to gain fame and wealth.
His neighbours in Bombay had included eminent lyricist, Gulzar, and famous Urdu writer, Krishan Chandar.
Begum Para (1926-2008), who was married to Pakistan’s first-ever film hero, Nasir Khan, had moved to Pakistan in 1975 after her husband’s death in 1974. Nasir was the younger brother of Bollywood icon Dilip Kumar.
Daughter of a Jalandhar-based judge Mian Ehsan-ul-Haq, Begum Para had to relocate back to India in 1977 though.
For those who are finding it hard to recall who Begum Para was, they can see her last performance in Bollywood’s 2007 movie “Saawariya.”
It is imperative to note that Indian citizenship and Long Term Visas (LTV) had been granted to 158 and 3,733 Pakistani Hindu nationals respectively since the NDA government announced the setting up of Special Task Force in September 2014.
According to Indian Home Ministry spokesman, 26 camps of the Task Force were organised in 26 districts across the country, during which 1,681 applications for citizenship and 1,665 for LTV were approved till May 2015.
(July 26 , 2015 edition of the “Economic Times”)
The October 28, 2015 edition of the BBC News had stated: “About 1,200 people, who have migrated from Pakistan in the past five years, are housed in three camps in Delhi and many say one of the biggest problems they faced back home was that they were unable to educate their children.”
The “Times of India” had added: “As a first step to granting Indian nationality to some 200,000 refugees from neighbouring countries, the BJP-led government has given citizenship to around 4,300 Hindus and Sikhs from Pakistan and Afghanistan in one year, according to sources. During the entire tenure of the previous government, the figure stood at 1,023.
The refugees have been given citizenship on the initiative of Home Minister Rajnath Singh following BJP’s declared policy that India is a “natural home for persecuted Hindus” who will be welcomed to seek refuge. During his election campaign, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said that Pakistani and Bangladeshi Hindu refugees would be treated like any other Indian citizen.”
