New Delhi Court Renews Search for Indians Linked to Ruto’s Presidential Campaign

This week, there was a court case in India concerning the disappearance of two Indians in Kenya before the 2022 general elections. 

Zulfiqar Ahmad Khan and Zaid Sami Kidwai were accompanied by their driver, Nicodemus Mwania, when they went missing on July 22. The Indians had been linked to the presidential campaigns of then-Deputy President William Ruto. After Ruto was sworn in as President in October, he disbanded a special police division that was blamed for the disappearances. 

At the New Delhi High Court, the judge concluded that the abduction of the two Indians may have been politically motivated and that neither the Kenyan nor Indian authorities were able to give any information about their whereabouts. In response, the court ordered the Indian government to submit a thorough report to the court containing details on what led to the two Indians vanishing. Anis Fatima Zacharia, Zulfiqar's sister, had presented a petition to the court prompting Justice Subramonium Prasad to ask that the report be sent within two weeks.

Ms Fatima's petition is scheduled for a hearing next month. Ms Fatima claims that her brother was detained in Kenya before he vanished last year prior to the Kenyan elections. She informed the court that her family had attempted to communicate with the Indian embassy in Nairobi and had submitted a habeas corpus request to the Kenyan High Court but their efforts were unsuccessful. Additionally, they had sent information to the offices of the Prime Minister of India and the Minister of External Affairs but had not been given a satisfactory response. 

Ms Fatima asked the court to direct the Indian authorities to collaborate with the Kenyan authorities in order to discover her brother's whereabouts. She also accused the Kenyan police officers of stopping the vehicle they were travelling in without justification. Mr Khan, who was allegedly set to be employed with President Ruto's media team in advance of the recent elections along with his friend and the driver, was last seen at a restaurant on Parklands Road in Westlands sub-county. They had left in a Toyota Fielder car.

On July 23, 2022, Ms Ambreen Kidwai, Mr Kidwai's wife, reported her husband's disappearance at Parklands Police Station only to be dismissed. The police told her to wait  48 hours before filing a missing person's report. She had been waiting for him at a hotel along Mombasa Road. Mr Khan had a successful career with several renowned media companies, such as Balaji Telefilms, Eros, Star TV India and Warner Brothers where he held the position of Chief Operating Officer (COO).