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Separated by Partition, two brothers to spend twilight years narrating tales, horrors of solitude
With social media as a helpmate, Sikka Khan of Phulewal village in Bathinda, got in touch with his brother Sadiq Khan through a Pakistan-based YouTube channel and with the help of a villager Jagsir Singh in India
AMRITSAR: After the touching reunion of septuagenarian Sikka Khan with his elder brother Sadiq Khan after 74 years at the Kartarpur Sahib Gurdwara in January this year, Sikka was finally issued a visa and he gleefully crossed over to Pakistan on Saturday.
With social media as a helpmate, Sikka Khan of Phulewal village in Bathinda, got in touch with his brother Sadiq Khan through a Pakistan-based YouTube channel and with the help of a villager Jagsir Singh in India.
Separated in 1947 when they were toddlers, the two will now stay together in Pakistan.
Their meeting created a social media buzz and hit headlines all over the world, with the Pakistan embassy issuing Sikka Khan a visa.
Though he had a three-month visa to stay with his family in Pakistan, he couldn’t go due to Covid-induced restrictions.
Sadiq Khan came to the Wagah side to receive his brother on Saturday.
After meeting his younger brother, Sadiq Khan said, “Finally, we are together. As we are in the twilight years of our lives, we request the government of Pakistan to allow Sikka Khan to stay with us forever. He has no one in India. There is so much to share and talk,” he said.
“It is nothing short of a miracle. What if one of us would have died before finding each other,” said Sadiq.
Six persons from Sikka’s village came to see him off at the international border.
“Our entire village has given him around ₹25,000 for his travel to Pakistan. Sikka Khan bought clothes for his brother and his children. He also bought bangles for his daughters-in-law. He has a three-month visa but he can stay for two months,” Dr Jagsir Singh, who played an important role in uniting both brothers.
Sikka Khan said, “At my village, people asked me to invite Sadiq Khan to India. I told them that I would go and bring him along. Phulewal village loves me. Villagers helped me in buying gifts for my brothers and daughters-in-law.
Sadiq Khan lives in Bogran village in Pakistan’s Faisalabad district. Sadiq, who is in his 80s told him about how in the summer of 1947 he and his father left his maternal home in what would become Indian Punjab without his younger brother and mother, and found themselves in two different countries.
Within a day, Dhillon was contacted by Jagsir Singh, the rural medical practitioner and dairy owner from Phulewal. He said the man Sadiq was looking for was Habib alias Sikka Khan, who lived in their village.
Sikka Khan and his relatives were among the Muslim families the village sheltered during Partition.
Sikka and his mother were guests at the village at that time. His maternal grandparents’ family still lives in Phulewal. There are seven Muslim families in the village.
Both brothers lost the parent with them soon after.
