Srinagar, May 14 (KMS): Fed up with the procedural complications involved in boarding the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad bus, a husband-wife duo living in two parts of Kashmir for the past 18 years, finally divorced to live separately.

Haneefa Begum and Fareed Ahmed who tied the nuptial knot in 1988, were happily married couple until Ahmed crossed the Line of Control. Haneefa waited for 18 long years for him to return home and even tried to go across to meet him.

Not once, seven times the tragedy-struck Heneefa applied for visiting Azad Kashmir through the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road after it was reopened to allow the separated families living across the LoC to meet each other. However, every time she was disallowed permission to visit her husband.

"I begged all the officers to give me a passport or a route permit for meeting my husband. But they told me that the Central Investigation Department was against issuance of permission to me," Haneefa said, adding that she even bribed some of the officers and narrated her tragic tale before the media but to no avail.

Arriving at a conclusion that they may not be able to meet one another for the rest of their lives, the two finally decided to forget about a reunion. "We both were against separation but laws of borders separated us," she said amid tears and sobs.