After being stuck in India for 54 years, a Chinese man is starting to feel like he’s now trapped in China.

Wang Qi served a Chinese army surveyor. Weeks after the conclusion of the Sino-Indian war in 1963, he was captured by Indian authorities after “getting lost” and crossing the border.

Over the next seven years, Wang was moved between a number of jails. When he was finally released, police escorted him to a remote village in central India and told him to start a life there. He married a local girl and started a family.

Wang’s status during these years remains something of a mystery. He was denied official Indian documents and citizenship again and again while also being denied the chance to go back to China. It appears that his case was essentially forgotten and swept under the rug by both sides for decades.

Forgotten that is until theBBCpublished a story on his plight in 2017. After the article was published, it took only a few weeks for Wang to be allowed to make an extremely long-overdue visit to his home village in rural Shaanxi province, reuniting with over 60 relatives and briefly becoming the biggest story in China.

After that, Wang was forgotten about again but another story from the British media outlet could see him return to the headlines.

Following his arrival back in China, Wang was given a one-year multiple-entry Indian visa which he was able to renew in 2018. However, he applied to renew it again in April 2019 and has yet to receive any response, causing him to reach out to the BBC once again.

“Why are they doing this? I’ve been fighting for such a long time. How much longer can I fight?” he told reporter Vineet Khare about his visa situation which is preventing him from visiting his children and grandchildren.