Pakistan decided to grant counselor access to 102 Indian prisoners. There are currently 537 Indian inmates in Pakistani jails. According to reports, 100 of the Indian prisoners who would be provided counselor access at the end of this month are in Karachi jails while two others are in a jail in Rawalpindi. Officials privy to the development expressed the hope that India would also give counselor access to 347 Pakistani prisoners, hoping that measures would be beneficial for building trust between the two countries. “Giving counselor access to Indian inmates will be Pakistan’s another step towards a peaceful neighbourhood,” they maintained. Two Pakistani nationals who were imprisoned in India crossed over to their home country through Wagah-Attari border crossing after they were released by Indian authorities in December last year. Indian border authorities had handed over the two men, Abdullah Shah and Imran Warsi, to Pakistan Rangers at the border. Shah, who hails from Swat’s Mingora city, was taken into custody by Indian officials from Attari in 2017 while Warsi, of Karachi, spent 10 years in a Bhopal jail on charges of ‘forgery and spying’ after travelling to India in 2004.
Published in Daily Times, February 12th 2019.
