India on Sunday decided to grant visa to a 25-year-old Pakistani cancer patient who is due to travel across the border for treatment.
"Thanks for your greetings on India's Independence day. We are giving you the visa for your treatment in India," Indian Minister for External Affairs Sushma Swaraj wrote on Twitter in response to Faiza Tanveer's impassioned plea that she be issued a visa on occasion of India's 70th independence anniversary.
"Ma'am, you are like [a] mother to me, please issue me a medical visa... [and] help me on this happy occasion of 70th year of independence. Thank you," Tanveer had tweeted earlier on Sunday. Last month, India had denied Tanveer the visa.
Tanveer was due to receive treatment at the Inderprastha Dental College and Hospital (IDCH) in Ghaziabad for a recurrent ameloblastoma, a cancerous oral tumour which is aggressive in nature.
The Indian Embassy had rejected Tanveer's medical visa application in July, citing deteriorating relations between the two countries.
She had then appealed to politicians in both countries to help facilitate her application.
A week after Tanveer was rejected a visa, Swaraj had said that visas would be issued to Pakistani patients on the recommendation of then Adviser to the Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz.
However, Aziz had refused to write a recommendation letter for Faiza, who will now travel to India for medical treatment in September.
The Indian minister had last month steered the direction of the matter to the visa application of Avantika Jadhav, the mother of Indian spy Kulbhushan Jadhav, which she said was pending in Pakistan.
“We also have a visa application pending for an Indian national. Ms Avantika Jadhav, who wants to meet her son in Pakistan,” she said.
Swaraj claimed that Aziz had not “acknowledged” a personal letter she wrote to him, asking for approval of Avantika’s visa application so that she may travel to meet her son. Kulbhushan Jadhav was sentenced to death by a military tribunal in Pakistan for espionage and terrorism earlier this year.
With additional reporting by Saifullah Cheema in Lahore.
