City techie who strayed into Pak on love trail returns
Prashant says Pak officials suspected him to be spy; he learnt Urdu in prison during 4-yr stay
A Hyderabad-based software engineer who had crossed over into Pakistan on his way to meet his lover in Switzerland, and was arrested by the police in Bhawalpur, Pakistan, was repatriated through the Wagah border on Monday.
Waindam Prashant, a resident of Madhapur and a native of Vizag, was brought back to Hyderabad on Tuesday evening, said Cyberabad police commissioner V.C. Sajjanar.
On April 29, 2017, a missing case was lodged at the Madhapur police station by Prashant’s family. They said he had gone missing on April 11.
Later, a video purportedly posted by him saying that he was in a Pakistani prison while trying to go to Switzerland to meet his girlfriend, was found in social media sites.
After the video went viral, his father Babu Rao approached the Cyberabad police and the state and Central governments for help. “After continuous follow up by the Telangana state government with the minister of external affairs and the ministry of home affairs, Prashant was released and handed over to Indian authorities on May 31, who in turn handed over him to Madhapur inspector P. Ravindra Prasad, in Attari, Punjab,” said Sajjanar.
Prashant, 32, had allegedly planned to impress the girl he was in love with by walking till Switzerland and showing up at her doorstep. The amateurishly planned adventure cost him four years of his life, he told the Madhapur inspector on his way back to the city.
Prashant could not speak Hindi before his ‘escapade’, but came back fluent in the local Urdu dialect and conversed easily with the authorities at the border, said Prasad, adding that the techie said he was overjoyed to speak in Telugu, his mother tongue, after four years.
The IT professional, who was around 28 when he jumped the fence and entered Pakistan, was found by the local authorities without a wallet or a mobile phone. “They were very sure that I was a spy connected to RAW,” he said.
Prashant, 32, had allegedly planned to impress the girl he was in love with by walking till Switzerland and showing up at her doorstep.
“Prashant had met the girl for whom he crossed the border when he was working in Bengaluru. She was his colleague and was a native of north India who shifted to Switzerland. Hoping that he would win her heart by walking to Switzerland, he took off from home. He was staying with his brother Srikanth in Kukatpally before he left the state,” said the Madhapur police inspector.
Prashant said there was a land route to Switzerland via Pakistan which takes about 60 days. Replying to a query in Punjab on Tuesday morning, he claimed he was beaten up by the Pakistani police, but did not want to fault them. He said he was treated well in the Lahore prison.
“On Tuesday afternoon, as we were heading back to the city, he asked me in Hindi if we could eat something as he had not eaten anything since morning. After I replied in Telugu that we will stop for lunch, he had this glow in his eyes and was expressing how happy he is to speak in his mother tongue after four years. He shared how he regrets the decisions and how he wasted four years of his prime youth behind a quest of a one-sided love,” added the official.
Prashant, while thanking the Telangana government and external affairs ministry for their efforts to bring him back, said he did not expect that he would come back to India so soon. “I owe a lot to the Telangana government and the Centre,” he said. The family members of Prashant profusely thanked the Telangana government, the Centre and officials for getting Prashant released safely.