Tears ran down Saira Javaid's eyes when she finally returned to visit her hometown of Karachi in Pakistan.

"I could not believe my eyes. I was overwhelmed with emotion," Saira told DW over the phone from her home in Karachi, which she affectionately calls the "the city of lights."

Saira struggled for 16 years while living in Indian-administered Kashmir to visit her family on the other side of the border as she was not allowed to leave due to the hostile relations between India and Pakistan. 

Saira is married to a former rebel, Javaid Ahmad, one of thousands of Kashmiri men who traveled from Indian-administered Kashmir into Pakistan in the early 1990s for training during the peak of an armed insurgency against Indian rule in the region.

How did Saira end up living in Indian-administered Kashmir?

Muslim-majority Kashmir has been divided between India and Pakistan since they became independent countries in 1947. Both countries claim the region in its entirety.

Insurgents in Kashmir have been fighting Indian rule since 1989. Tens of thousands of people have been killed in the armed conflict.

Javaid and Saira met through her relatives and the couple married in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi in 2001.

Six years later, when Javaid's mother became ill, he and Saira traveled to Indian-administered Kashmir along with their two children. 

Javaid had been feeling homesick and wanted to return to his home in north Kashmir's Kupwara district, a border town that divides Kashmir between Indian and Pakistani-administered territories.

When he and Saira got to Kupwara, her in-laws insisted they stay there.

Trapped in limbo

While Javaid was glad to be back in Indian-administered Kashmir, Saira was unhappy there because she was separated from her loved ones in Pakistan and not allowed to return to them.

"The problem began to surface when we arrived in Kashmir," said Saira sorrowfully.

In 2010, authorities in India announced a rehabilitation policy and amnesty for former rebels while their families were stuck in Pakistan.

According to the policy, people who had traveled to the Pakistani side between January 1989 and December 2009 were eligible for the rehabilitation program along with their family members.

Many of the insurgents had married in Pakistan and brought their wives and children to India-controlled Kashmir with them.

Under the 2010 program, at least 350 former insurgents returned to India-administered Kashmir with their Pakistani wives and children.   

But many of the Pakistani women told DW that they have faced multiple issues, such as a lack of livelihood, discrimination from in-laws, issues with schooling for their children and even physical abuse from their husbands.

Perhaps the biggest problem for the Pakistani women, though, is the death of a loved one back home.

"I saw my father's funeral through a video call. That was heart-wrenching for me. I protested and prayed day and night. I think those prayers have finally been answered," Saira said.

Returning to her homeland

A local office for foreigners told Saira in June that she was finally allowed to travel to Pakistan.

But the news was bittersweet for her because a part of her life — her husband — remained in Kashmir.

"He dropped me at the border. On one side, I was overwhelmed with joy that I was going back but on the other side, my heart was into pieces as I was leaving my husband behind. I believe we should be allowed to freely travel to see each other's families," she said.

Saira had over the years become well known for inspiring other women who took part in protests and press conferences in Srinagar, the capital of Indian-administered Kashmir.

Hope for change

Saira, who ran a boutique and salon in Kupwara, has sparked hope among other women who are waiting to be reunited with their families.

Nusrat Rashid is from Neelam Valley in Pakistan-administered Kashmir and arrived in Indian-administered Kashmir with her husband in 2010, four weeks after their marriage.

She has two daughters and was divorced in 2020 which made her life doubly difficult.

"My life is miserable, I have to earn myself for my daughters and I live on rent. I want the government to listen to our plea," Nusrat told DW, who also lives in north Kashmir's Kupwara.

Nusrat works at Saira's boutique along with another woman, Bushra Farooq, who is from Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-administered Kashmir and returned to Kashmir in 2012 along with her husband.

Both women are divorced and desperate to go back.

"We are also hopeful that someday our prayers will also be answered, too."

Edited by: Keith Walker