After Kashmir Singh, leading Pakistani rights activist Ansar Burney has found another Indian on death row, Karpal Singh, languishing in a jail in Punjab province since 1992.
Burney, a former Pakistan human rights minister, said on Tuesday that workers of his organisation had come across Karpal in the course of their welfare work in prisons.
Karpal, who hails from Gurdaspur, was convicted of murder and destroying property in 1992 and is currently in a prison in Punjab province.
"Interestingly, while the case was registered in the railway station in Faisalabad, Karpal Singh was convicted by
an anti-terrorism court in Lahore," Burney told PTI on phone from London, expressing doubts about whether Karpal had been given a fair trial.
During his years in prison, Karpal's name had also been changed to Fateh Mohammed. Burney said his organisation is currently trying to locate Karpal's family in India. All that is known about Karpal's family is that his father's name is Das Singh.
Burney's revelation came at a time when a four-member Indian team of bilateral judicial committee on prisoners is
touring Pakistan to visit the Indian nationals lodged in this country's jails.
Burney on Tuesday wrote a letter to Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar, urging them to commute the sentences of all prisoners on death row, including Indian nationals Karpal Singh and Sarabjit Singh, to life imprisonment.
The rights activist also called on Gilani to order the release of all prisoners in Pakistani jails, including Indians, who had completed their sentences.
Burney said all death sentences should be commuted to life imprisonment as 65 per cent of prisoners on death row in Pakistan "are innocent or victims of inadequate trial, false witnesses and enmity". They included Karpal Singh and Sarabjit Singh, he said.
Burney, who served as human rights minister in the caretaker government before the February 18 general election,
highlighted the cases of several Indian prisoners who were still in Pakistani prisons despite having served their
sentences.
"It is in the greater interest of justice and human rights to convert all such death sentences into life imprisonment without any further delay and release all prisoners who have already completed their jail terms," he said.
Any discrimination in showing mercy to foreign prisoners would be a "clear violation of justice and human rights", he said.
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