A furtive romance between a Dalit teen and his Brahmin classmate and neighbour was blossoming in the summer lockdown of 2020, in remote, dust-blown Kumharon Ka Teebba village in Rajasthan’s Barmer. Their families and villagers weren’t exactly happy.
But Gemra Ram Meghwal, then a 17-year-old from the Meghwal community, was in love with his bug-eyed neighbour Priya (name changed). Two years later, caste isn’t what ruined it for the star-crossed lovers. It was the 3,323-km-long fenced India-Pakistan border that came in the way.
Gemra has been in a Karachi jail for two years. And just about everybody seems to have moved on – the villagers, BSF, Pakistan Rangers, and even Priya.
Gemra, 20, is now called Raj in Pakistan.
“He’s a young, poor boy who inadvertently went to Pakistan. But his life is being ruined. For what? For falling in love with an upper-caste girl? Gemra has already served double the sentence he was due. His early release should be ensured by India,” Dharma Ram, a social worker from the Meghwal community says.
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A young romance ends at the LoC
Priya and Gemra would steal dates away from the judgemental glares of the villagers, always had a smile glued to their faces when they walked together and were seen gossiping and laughing and playing together during the Covid-induced lockdown. “It’s a small village and there isn’t much to do. I could smell something fishy going on between the two of them during lockdown, when they would often walk together,” said Gemra’s elder brother.
But Priya and Gemra’s families would have none of it. The lovers had to be separated. As lockdown eased, Gemra was packed off to Jodhpur to work as a carpenter. Now their romance had to brave the test of distance.
On 4 November 2020, taking advantage of the secrecy of the night, Gemra trespassed into Priya’s house. Gemra’s family alleges Priya had herself called him. But this wasn’t a late-night lovers’ rendezvous, she says. The clandestine visit didn’t have her approval, and Priya now alleges that Gemra tried to rape her.
When Gemra broke into the house, Priya’s mother yelled for help. He was caught red-handed. Priya’s father, seething in rage, chased him with a bat in his hands. But he was no match for the athletic 17-year-old who sprinted on, unconsciously moving towards the Line of Control, dividing India and Pakistan, located just about 2 kilometres from their village.
Gemra ran for his life in order to escape caste violence, and crossed the border fencing.
The Dalit teen is assumed to have sneaked in from under the tall border fences, where wild boars usually dig pits to cross over. He then took shelter with a Meghwal family on the other side of the border in a Pakistan village and was eventually caught by the Pakistani Rangers. He has been languishing in Karachi’s Landi jail since April 2021, five months after he crossed the border.
Gemra’s case is now caught in subcontinental disregard, delay and diplomatic sloth.
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India wants Gemra, Pakistan wants goats
A day after the incident, on 5 November 2020, the khojis of India’s Border Security Force (BSF), noted footprints going toward Pakistan during their routine morning patrol. Khojis are people trained to track footprints on sand. The battalion reached Kumharon Ka Teebba village in the afternoon to find if anyone’s missing, said a BSF spokesperson. “The Meghwal family maintained that Gemra Ram was in Jodhpur and couldn’t have been the one to cross over to Pakistan,” he told ThePrint.
“Father was working in the field, and I wasn’t home, the house was empty. Priya must have called him that night, we didn’t know he was here,” said Gemra’s elder brother Jugtra Ram, who still asserts that the family didn’t know he was in the village on the night of 4 November.
For 10 days, India couldn’t confirm that Gemra had crossed the border since there was no clarity on what had happened. It was when the Pakistani Rangers showed Gemra Ram’s Aadhaar card to the BSF in an informal meeting that it could be confirmed the teen was on the other side of the border.
And then came the ‘swap’ offer.
In the same meeting, the Rangers brought up the issue of some 80 goats that had crossed over to India and demanded they be returned.
India returned the goats that month, but Gemra never came back. “It is true that around the time we had returned some Pakistani goats, but that’s pretty routine. There was no barter as such,” said a BSF spokesperson. “In the past year, we have returned three Pakistani nationals who had come to India by mistake on humanitarian grounds, but Pakistan doesn’t return the favour,” he added.
The spokesperson said in late June there was a commandant-level meeting where the BSF again raised the issue of Gemra Ram with the Rangers. “We have done everything in our power to ensure that Gemra comes home,” he said.
But crucial time was lost in the first few days when no one knew where Gemra was and whether he had crossed over.
“The family was unwilling to file a missing report for Gemra, and were insisting that he was in Jodhpur, not Pakistan. It’s after the Rangers gave us an Aadhaar card that we could confirm that the boy is in Pakistan,” a BSF spokesperson said.
The family disagrees and says they couldn’t confirm if it was indeed Gemra who had gone to Pakistan. A missing persons’ complaint was finally filed by Jama Ram, the teen’s father on 12 November 2020, eight days after his son’s disappearance. The BSF claims it was at their insistence that the report was filed.
Between the family’s dithering, BSF and Rangers’ negotiations, Gemra’s journey to becoming Raj in the enemy territory began.
Gemra sends a letter from jail
In August 2021, the South Karachi sessions court sentenced Gemra Ram to six months of rigorous imprisonment under Pakistan’s Foreigners Act, 1946. But one year later, he remains there, caught behind bars.
“India-Pakistan prisoners aren’t released on the basis of court orders, but during prisoner exchange between the two countries. In my personal capacity, I’m trying to ensure Gemra’s release,” Ansar Burney, a Karachi-based advocate who works for India-Pakistan prisoners said.
In jail, he has also adopted a new identity. Gemra identifies himself as ‘Raj’, and works in the canteen, a Gujarati fisherman who was lodged in the same jail cell as Gemra in Pakistan told ThePrint.
“He’s a quiet boy and is becoming leaner by the minute. He keeps to himself and works in the canteen,” he said. “He’s never said anything about having a girlfriend.” The fisherman had been in jail for almost a year, and
When the fisherman was released in June, he carried a gift for the Meghwal family— a letter from Gemra dated 18 June 2022. Gemra had written that he was not being given a hard time in jail, asked about the health of his parents and extended family, and hoped to come home soon. The family has received only one letter till now. Written in fantastic handwriting and competent Hindi, the letter begins by praising Ganesh, the Hindu god. But it never mentions Priya.
And Gemra doesn’t know his father has passed away.
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The long wait for a son
The notes in the social studies book of Gemra Ram are unfinished, the last entry made in mid-October 2020. His crumpled school uniform lies in one corner of a brick-walled room, and so do the clothes he left hanging. This is the little corner Gemra claimed as his own, in a house where privacy is in short supply – he has nine brothers and two sisters. Toddlers of his elder brothers also run around in the house, while their fathers work as carpenters in Jodhpur city.
Since Gemra went missing, his mother, Amku, hasn’t moved his things. But no matter how hard she tried to freeze time, things changed.
Her husband Jama Ram died of a heart attack in December 2021.
“Gemra’s disappearance left a hole in his heart, and he died of the pain,” Amku claims.
Meanwhile, Priya denies any relationship with Gemra. “The family, in order to tarnish my name, has spread the rumour that he and I were seeing each other. It’s an utter lie,” she says. Priya’s family has also alleged in an FIR dated 1 April 2021 that Gemra attempted to rape her, though this is something she didn’t tell ThePrint when it visited her.
The FIR has been registered under IPC sections 460 (trespassing), 376 (rape) and 384 (extortion).
The men in the village, however, say that Priya and Gemra had established a strong bond during the lockdown, and rumours of an affair had been rife. “He was just a classmate whom I helped with homework here and there, I had absolutely no other interaction with him,” Priya refuted.
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Gemra gone, waiting for Raj to come home
What happens to Gemra now?
“Gemra’s name should have been in the list of prisoners we exchanged in January 2022, but it wasn’t. I have been in constant touch with the Joint Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs responsible for Pakistan, and have kept him abreast of Gemra’s matter,” explained former Rajasthan MLA and Congress leader Manvendra Singh. “They have all the necessary documents from Karachi. Now it’s up to the MEA to get him home.”
As a routine matter, India and Pakistan exchange a list of prisoners every six months, and usually both countries release prisoners every six months.
ThePrint reached out to Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Arindam Bagchi via WhatsApp and Pakistan’s Joint Secretary via mail but there was no response at the time of publishing. ThePrint also wrote to Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Pakistan for a comment but was blocked.
Gemra’s family fears that he might face arrest once he’s back, but that doesn’t mean they are any less energetic in their crusade to ensure his safe return home. “It’s his human right to come home once he has served his sentence. Rest we’ll see once he’s back,” Dharma Ram, the social worker, says.
In the meantime, Gemra remains in Karachi’s Landi Jail, with a ladle instead of a pen in his hands. “Just because one has completed their sentence doesn’t mean they’ll be released. Gemra will come back to his motherland only when a prisoner swap happens, and India and Pakistan both can confirm he’s an Indian citizen,” advocate Ansar Burney says.
The love story, it seems, has come to an end.
Raj, as he’s known there, doesn’t talk about the girl back home. Priya has moved on.
“As I told you, he’s just another classmate. What happens to him is of no concern to me.”
(Edited by Neera Majumdar)