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Indian being held in Pakistan jail since 1973
A 73-year-old Indian national has been found languishing in a Pakistan prison for the past 35 years on spying charges, Gulf News has learnt.
- By Ashfaq Ahmed, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:55 February 11, 2008
Dubai: A 73-year-old Indian national has been found languishing in a Pakistan prison for the past 35 years on spying charges, Gulf News has learnt.
Pakistan's Federal Minister for Human Rights Ansar Burney said yesterday that he had traced an Indian national waiting for his death sentence to be carried out in a prison cell in Lahore.
Burney told Gulf News from Pakistan that he came across the prisoner accidently during a visit to a jail.
"When I checked the jail records, I found out that Kashmir Singh, son of Sansar Singh, was arrested in 1973 on espionage charges in Pakistan and sentenced to death under the Official Secrets Act 1923 by the military court in Lahore 35 years ago. He has been languishing in a Pakistani death cell ever since," he added.
Burney, who is also a prominent human rights activist and Chairman of Ansr Burney Trust, said that he tried to search Kashmir Singh several years ago after some people from the Indian community in London approached him but failed to trace him at that time.
During a visit to Lahore Central Jail as part of his plans for prison reforms, Burney visited the various death cells and came across Kashmir Singh - now a weak, old and mentally disabled man.
At the time of his arrest, he was a husband and a father of three young children - two boys and a girl. He has not seen any of them ever since then.
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