INDIA:A 61-YEAR-OLD Indian Sikh, who had spent 35 years on death row in Pakistan after being convicted of spying, returned home to his wife and two sons yesterday following a pardon by president Pervez Musharraf.
Kashmir Singh, a former policeman turned electronic goods trader, was arrested in the Pakistani garrison city of Rawalpindi in 1973 at the age of 26, allegedly trying to smuggle some merchandise into India and was sentenced to death by a military court.
Thereafter, he got lost in the system as he was held under the Official Secrets Act until he was discovered by Pakistan human rights minister Ansar Burney following a tip-off earlier this year.
During his entire period in confinement, Singh is said not to have received even a single visitor.
Burney, who tracks people like Singh across Pakistani jails, then persuaded President Musharraf to revoke his death sentence and order his release.
"I am very, very happy and will escort him back to a gurdwara [ Sikh temple] to pray," Singh's wife Paramjeet Kaur told reporters at Wagah, the only official land border crossing between the two states.