More heartache has come to the AA. Thoddoo family said to have been "lost" to India because the register in which the family was registered has also been abolished. The challenges and concerns facing the family in connection with this issue have grown significantly.
Expressing concern over this, the family has now submitted the case to the Human Rights Commission of the Maldives (HRCM) and the Local Government Authority (LGA).
Thoddoo Register Number 03, Abdulsattar, told "Mihaaru News" that the abolition of that register by the Thoddoo Council is a very big loss incurred by him and his three other siblings while they remained in despair without housing.
He stated that they will go to all relevant authorities to express that concern.
After going to the HRCM yesterday to submit the complaint regarding the matter, the family also went to the Local Government Authority.
"We have submitted this complaint to both the HRCM and the LGA. The LGA is not hearing this complaint. We are going today as well to make them hear this complaint," he said.
Speaking through an interpreter due to Sattar's rustiness in the Dhivehi language stemming from living in India since early childhood, his elder brother Jaufar Sodig stated that the family's sole concern is not just the abolition of the register. He accused the council of closing off all doors through which they could obtain a plot of land from the island, given that even though they were not born in Thoddoo, they are children of a Thoddoo native. As an example of this, he pointed out that when allocating land plots in Thoddoo, being born on the island is determined as a matter that grants half of the points. The family accuses this of being a move "directly to cut this family out."
"Previously it was 20 for those born in Thoddoo, now it is set at 50, leaving us with absolutely no opportunity. We said, why not give points to those on the registry? Now the registry has even been abolished," Sattar said.
This is a Maldivian family "Lost" to India
Sattar, Jaufar, and their father Ali Waheed Mohamed (Dhon Alibe), who, along with six other siblings, is the son of Ali Waheed Mohamed, was a man who went to India to study during the 1960s. Since the government did not permit going abroad for education at the time, Ali Waheed Mohamed went to India secretly on a sea boat.
After that, no news of him reached the Maldives. The people of Thoddoo also concluded that Ali Waheed Mohamed was lost. However, Ali Waheed Mohamed built his life in India. While carrying out work such as serving as the muezzin of mosques in Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu, and officiating marriages for Muslims after finishing his studies, he also married an Indian woman and had children.
Only a very few people knew that he was alive. Among them was his elder brother residing in Thoddoo.
"Father informed his elder brother about his marriage and that a child was born, and even sent photos. Uncle knew that we were born. But we don't know why uncle didn't talk about us," Ali Waheed Mohamed's second eldest child, Jaufar, stated in an interview given years ago in 2015 to the "Haveeru" newspaper.
The people of Thoddoo came to know that Ali Waheed Mohamed was alive in an unusual way as well.
In the 1980s, some fishermen adrift from the Maldives landed near the area where Ali Waheed Mohamed lived in India. Since it was known which country the fishermen belonged to, Indian police had Ali Waheed Mohamed meet them. Furthermore, Ali Waheed Mohamed looked after those fishermen's well-being until they were rescued and returned to the Maldives.
A short while after that, they met some people from Thoddoo at the Malé fish market. And they related the story of Ali Waheed Mohamed. It was from that point onward that his friends residing in Thoddoo learned that Ali Waheed Mohamed was safely alive.
"After that, father's friends came to India and met with us, and also requested us to go to the island," Jaufar stated at the time.
Finally, Ali Waheed Mohamed wished to return to his homeland, bringing his wife and children. By then, he was unaccustomed to Dhivehi. None of the eight children knew any Dhivehi.
Jaufar stated that when he arrived in Malé, the words he knew were "father" and "child." In India, they used to converse in Tamil.
However, now all members of that family converse in the Dhivehi language.
"Upon returning to the Maldives, my own land plot was not obtained"
Sattar stated that when his father went to India to study, he had a large personal land plot. He said that since his father's return was delayed, his uncle told his father's children that his uncle's child could be told to build a house in one corner of that land plot because there was a fear that the land plot might be lost, as his father had recounted to the children.
However, when Ali Waheed Mohamed returned to the Maldives with a large family after many years, he did not get a land plot of his own. By the time he passed away, no solution had been found for that matter.
"We do not want to go to court and sue over that matter," Sattar and other members of the family stated.
The family requests that Thoddoo citizenship not be lost from their hands and that a way be arranged for them to also obtain a land plot from that island, he stated.
