Award-winning Kashmiri filmmaker Arfat Sheikh has been detained by US immigration authorities after entering the country legally for film studies and later seeking asylum, according to his family and friends.
According to Reuters, The US Department of Homeland Security confirmed that Sheikh was arrested on 24 September. The department said he had entered the United States on a temporary basis but remained after his authorised stay expired.
It added that a pending immigration application does not itself grant legal status and that Sheikh would receive due process.
Sheikh’s relatives and friends said he was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement after arriving at Washington Dulles International Airport on a flight from California.
He entered the US in 2019 on a student visa to study film at Georgia State University and filed for asylum in 2020.
Sheikh, who is from India-administered Kashmir, directed the 2024 feature ‘Saffron Kingdom’, which explores the region’s conflict through a family’s journey from Srinagar to Atlanta.
The film won Best Feature Film at several international festivals, including the Chicago Filmmakers Awards, LA Film and Documentary Awards, Melbourne Independent Film Festival and Wake Forest Film Festival.
He also received the Emerging Filmmaker Activist Award at the Teaneck International Film Festival.
Sheikh’s detention comes amid a broader tightening of US immigration enforcement under President Donald Trump.
The administration has also targeted cases involving people who entered the country on temporary visas before seeking asylum.
