By Rana Ajit, IANS
New Delhi : Jammu and Kashmir National Panther’s Party chief Bhim Singh says he would try use his goodwill in Pakistan for release of Indian national Sarabjit Singh, awaiting the noose there.
Bhim Singh Monday said he was to write to President Parvez Musharraf to pardon Sarabjit Singh and was also trying to move the Supreme Court of Pakistan personally to secure his release.
Pakistani courts have convicted Sarbajit for allegedly triggering a bomb blast in Lahore in 1990. President Musharraf has dismissed his mercy plea. Sarabjit’s death warrant has been issued and April 1 has been fixed as the date of his execution.
Bhim Singh told IANS: “I am going to write to Musharraf sahib in a day two to pardon him. If for nothing else, for the sake of a tit-for-tat reply to all my efforts in India in securing freedom for nearly 250 Pakistani nationals.”
Bhim Singh has secured Supreme Court orders for the release of many Pakistani nationals from Indian jails. Some of them have already been released and pleas of many others are still pending with the apex court.
“I am also going to tell the Pakistan president that I fought on humanitarian grounds for the freedom of those very people who came to India with blazing guns and killed innocent people here.
“Yet we garlanded them and worked for their release, once it was clear to me that many of them were languishing in Indian jails beyond the sentences imposed on them,” said the Panther’s Party chief.
“I’m going to ask Musharraf to just reciprocate, for the larger human values and for the better ties between the two neighbours,” he added.
Bhim Singh said that in his meeting with Pakistan president on March 12, 2007, he had taken up the issue of the release of Indian nationals from Pakistani jails and Musharraf seemed receptive to his plea.
He is also trying to reach Islamabad to move the Supreme Court of Pakistan personally for release of Sarabjit.
“In a day or two, I will also apply to Pakistan High Commission for visa to visit Islamabad to move the apex court there for Sarbajit’s release,” said Bhim Singh, who is also a lawyer.
Asked if an Indian lawyer can move court in Pakistan, Singh said: “I am a barrister-at-law. And any barrister of a commonwealth country is entitled to move a court in a commonwealth country.”
“I’m going to plead to the Supreme Court of Pakistan to reciprocate to the magnanimity of the Indian judiciary, which has ordered Indian government to release Pakistani nationals from various Indian jails on my petition,” said Singh.
A bench of Justice B.N. Agrawal is hearing Bhim Singh’s petition for the Pakistani prisoners.
On his petition, Justice Agarwal’s bench has been examining, for over a year now, cases of various Pakistani nationals lodged in various high-security prisons all over India.