Blood on bridge never built: Hero theory with half names
NASIR JAFFRY IN ISLAMABAD AND OUR DELHI BUREAU
NASIR JAFFRY IN ISLAMABAD AND OUR DELHI BUREAU
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| Rahul Gandhi hugs Sarabjit Singh’s sister Dalbir Kaur in New Delhi on Thursday. (PTI) |
May 2: One version in Pakistan holds that Aamir and Mudassir assaulted Sarabjit Singh with bricks to become “national heroes”. If adulation indeed was the objective, most people in Pakistan still do not know the full names of the assailants.
Little information has been shared about the alleged killers — other than the single names and the detail that Lahore police are in the process of slapping murder charges on the duo who are already on death row.
“They both belong to Lahore and were living in two different condemned cells close to that of Sarabjit,” a provincial government official said.
“We are investigating the matter and it will be tantamount to compromising the ongoing interrogation if we share anything further about them. We have to know why they attacked Singh and whether it was an individual act or they got directions from elsewhere.”
The Nation, an English language newspaper in Pakistan, had reported on Saturday that Aamir and Mudassir had told investigators they planned the attack by themselves to thwart Sarabjit’s possible return to India and to become heroes.
The report referred to links with “street gangs” and said the duo had been sentenced to death for murdering a public representative. One investigator was quoted as saying the duo could have attacked Sarabjit to delay their own deaths, although Pakistan has put in place a rolling moratorium on executions for the past few years.
The News, another English paper, quoted the police as saying initial investigations “pointed to an exchange of hot words”.
A jail official told The Telegraph today: “There are many men and many words. We still have to see why these two inmates injured Singh when he came out of his cell for an evening stroll.”
Another senior jail official denied that attacks by inmates were common. “This incident is the first of its kind. There have been scuffles among prisoners but never before was a foreigner injured or killed by inmates,” said the official who did not want to be named.
Like many other jails in the sub-continent, the 81 prisons in Pakistan are packed beyond their capacity and infamous for poor hygiene. An official said that on average, 15 people were lodged in a cell meant for five.
Kot Lakhpat, where Sarabjit was imprisoned, has over 3,700 prisoners — “far higher than the capacity of the jail which was built in the mid-1960s”, a senior Punjab prisons official said.
The reasons also have a familiar subcontinental ring. The official said that the “overstuffing” was partly because of slow prosecution. The death row too is crowded because Pakistan has been extending the moratorium on executions every three months. Aamir and Mudassir have been in Kot Lakhpat jail since 2007.
In Pakistan, speculation also revolved around suggestions that many prisoners were upset over the hanging of Afzal Guru, who was convicted of plotting the Indian Parliament attack.
Some officials cited resentment among prisoners over New Delhi’s refusal to reciprocate the release of Indian inmates by Pakistan.
Little information has been shared about the alleged killers — other than the single names and the detail that Lahore police are in the process of slapping murder charges on the duo who are already on death row.
“They both belong to Lahore and were living in two different condemned cells close to that of Sarabjit,” a provincial government official said.
“We are investigating the matter and it will be tantamount to compromising the ongoing interrogation if we share anything further about them. We have to know why they attacked Singh and whether it was an individual act or they got directions from elsewhere.”
The Nation, an English language newspaper in Pakistan, had reported on Saturday that Aamir and Mudassir had told investigators they planned the attack by themselves to thwart Sarabjit’s possible return to India and to become heroes.
The report referred to links with “street gangs” and said the duo had been sentenced to death for murdering a public representative. One investigator was quoted as saying the duo could have attacked Sarabjit to delay their own deaths, although Pakistan has put in place a rolling moratorium on executions for the past few years.
The News, another English paper, quoted the police as saying initial investigations “pointed to an exchange of hot words”.
A jail official told The Telegraph today: “There are many men and many words. We still have to see why these two inmates injured Singh when he came out of his cell for an evening stroll.”
Like many other jails in the sub-continent, the 81 prisons in Pakistan are packed beyond their capacity and infamous for poor hygiene. An official said that on average, 15 people were lodged in a cell meant for five.
Kot Lakhpat, where Sarabjit was imprisoned, has over 3,700 prisoners — “far higher than the capacity of the jail which was built in the mid-1960s”, a senior Punjab prisons official said.
The reasons also have a familiar subcontinental ring. The official said that the “overstuffing” was partly because of slow prosecution. The death row too is crowded because Pakistan has been extending the moratorium on executions every three months. Aamir and Mudassir have been in Kot Lakhpat jail since 2007.
In Pakistan, speculation also revolved around suggestions that many prisoners were upset over the hanging of Afzal Guru, who was convicted of plotting the Indian Parliament attack.
Some officials cited resentment among prisoners over New Delhi’s refusal to reciprocate the release of Indian inmates by Pakistan.
Courtesy: The Telegraph
