The Jammu and Kashmir Police on Tuesday detained a 17-year-old Afghan boy in Lakhanpur town in Kathua district, Greater Kashmir reported.

Lakhanpur is situated on the border between Punjab and Jammu and Kashmir, and is a gateway to the Union Territory.

The police said they have detained the boy, Abdul Rehman, to verify his travel documents and ascertain why he wanted to enter the Union Territory. He was apprehended near a Covid-19 testing centre in the town.

Kathua Senior Superintendent of Police RC Kotwal said that as per preliminary information, Rehman had come to India for his brother’s medical treatment at Delhi’s RR Hospital. Rehman reportedly told the police that his brother works in the Afghan army.

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Kotwal said that the boy travelled to India on valid documents and no case has been registered against him so far, according to Greater Kashmir.

He added that the police have not recovered anything incriminating from him so far.

A report by the Hindustan Times quoted unidentified police officials as saying that Rehman said that he was heading to the Kashmir region. He reportedly told the police that he wanted to cross over to Pakistan and then travel further to Afghanistan, because he was feeling homesick.

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The officials said that he had arrived in India in July.

The 17-year-old has been detained in the backdrop of a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan, after the Taliban took control of Kabul on August 15.

In the aftermath of the Taliban takeover, large crowds of people thronged the Kabul airport in an attempt to leave the country. Distressing visuals had shown some Afghans clinging to the side of a moving United States military plane leaving the airport.

On Tuesday, India’s ambassador to Qatar Deepak Mittal met Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai, the head of Taliban’s political office, in Doha. This was the first official meeting between an Indian diplomat and the Taliban since the insurgent group took over Afghanistan two weeks ago.