30 Ulhasnagar residents received citizenship certificates years after they left Pakistan, on Friday. (Express Photo by Deepak Joshi)FOR 32-YEAR-OLD Sapna Bangeja, July 26 will always stay a happy memory. “Finally, my children can say their parents are Indians. I have the paperwork to support it now,” she said. On Friday, Bangeja was among the 30 residents of Ulhasnagar, all immigrants from the Sindh province of Pakistan, who were granted Indian citizenship by the Thane collector.
“The central government delegated the power to district magistrates and collectors in 2016. The process has remained the same, to give citizenship, we check their character, their verification report is filed after they give proof of earlier citizenship. After the due process, we give out the certificates. The process is on as there are still pending applications,” said Thane collector Rajesh Narvekar.
For the Bangeja family, the move from Pakistan to India in 1999 was an act of uprooting the entire family. “Eight of us had moved to Ulhasnagar as we had heard that many Sindhis live here. But procuring a shelter or even a job was an uphill battle,” said 37-year-old Darpan Bangeja.
He added, “No one would give us houses on rent either as we were ‘Pakistanis’ for everyone. We had left everything in so much pain and distress, it was just compounded in the years when we had just moved.”
However, the family persisted and not only grew economically but even literally. “When I got married, I was not an Indian citizen. Too many things could have gone wrong but my wife’s family was understanding. It was similar with my sister’s (Sapna’s) in-laws as well. We have now bought properties in the area and even own a property brokerage business. We have come a long way,” Bangeja said. Bangeja’s sister Sapna and mother Isha Devi (66) were two others among the 30 who received citizenship documents. “My mother had been waiting for her documents for over a decade. She had applied long back,” Darpan said. Isha Devi added, “It is always good to know you officially belong.”
The event on July 26 opened the doors for the Dheda-Maheshwari family to apply for Indian citizenship after Ashok Kumar Dheda (62) and his wife Daribai (57) got the citizenship documents. “We moved to India in 2009 after realising that Pakistan could never be our country, our home. Our lives were miserable, my sisters couldn’t step out of the house and for us there was no education or job opportunities,” Sunny Maheshwari said.
The family of six moved to India after the murder of Benazir Bhutto led to mass mobs attacking them. “It was so scary that we thought anything would be better than this,” his father Ashok said. He added, “We were treated like sub-humans there, we worked as helpers in shops. But once we came to India, family and even otherwise, people opened their houses, shops and hearts to us. We got jobs easily and we felt safe.” Moving to their uncle’s house in Ulhasnagar felt like homecoming for Maheshwari.
Sunny and his four siblings are unmarried, not all by choice. “No one wanted to marry us as we are still technically Pakistanis. Even the people who understood our circumstances would think we will go back or be pushed to leave. Now, all of us will send applications and officially become Indians,” he said.
