Kerala woman asks court to allow her daughter who had joined ISIS to return to India

Bindu Sampath, the mother of Nimisha alias Fathima, has filed a second writ petition at the Kerala High Court, to direct the Union government for the return of her daughter and granddaughter who are in a prison in Afghanistan. Live Law reports that the second petition was filed after an earlier habeas corpus petition for the same purpose was withdrawn.

The High Court had granted permission to Bindu Sampath to file a second petition. She has sought in her second petition, a writ of mandamus, instead of habeas corpus.

Nimisha, an Indian citizen, converted to Islam and changed her name to Fathima before going away to Afghanistan with her husband to join the Islamic State in Khorasan Province in 2016. Three years later, a few women including Nimisha Fathima surrendered before the Afghan authorities. She has since been in jail with her child, who is now four years old.

Bindu Sampath has been fighting to get her daughter and granddaughter to come back to India. However, even after the Afghanistan government was ready to deport them back to India along with the other detainees, the Government of India refused to take them back.

Bindu's new plea says that she has been seeking the help of several authorities including the Union Ministries of Home Affairs and External Affairs as well as the National Human Rights Commission. However, all the authorities responded by saying that they did not possess any information about her daughter, Bindu claims. Such inaction is a violation of Fundamental Rights under Article 21, Bindu alleges in her plea. She also assures in her plea that Nimisha Fathima and her daughter will not pose a threat to the nation's security.

Citing the repatriation of Nashidul Hamzafar, an ISIS recruit who was deported to India in 2018, Bindu argues that the Union government has taken a "much harsher approach to women and innocent children who had surrendered in comparison to that of an arrested terrorist."

Read: Family of Kerala woman who joined ISIS upset as govt won't allow return