A fisherman from Gujarat who had been languishing in a jail in Pakistan’s Karachi, despite his sentence having ended in 2022, died in custody on January 16, journalist and activist Jatin Desai told Scroll.
In early 2022, the fisherman inadvertently crossed into Pakistani waters. About seven or eight others who were caught with him remain in jail in Karachi, Desai said.
Desai, a peace activist who has for several years been taking up the cause of Indian fisherfolk arrested in Pakistan, did not disclose the name of the fisherman who died.
However, he noted that a 2008 bilateral agreement between India and Pakistan on consular access states that arrested persons should be released and repatriated to each other’s countries within one month of their nationality being confirmed and their sentences being completed.
“As per this document, the fisherman should have been released long ago,” Desai told Scroll. “But for that to happen, the agreement has to be implemented in letter and spirit.”
The journalist-activist claimed that three to four Indian fishers die in Karachi’s Malir Jail every year. “In the first place, such persons should not be arrested at all,” he said. “If they are arrested, a situation should certainly not arise in which they die in prison.”
Desai said that India and Pakistan should follow a no-arrest policy for fisherfolk who inadvertently cross the maritime border, and should instead push them back to their own countries.
“The International Maritime Border between India and Pakistan is a notional line, and so, it is always possible for fishers to accidentally cross over to the other side,” he said. “Fisherfolk come from marginalised communities, and are usually not very well-educated. So, instead of putting them through legal processes, their cases should be seen through a humanitarian lens.”
A delegation of women from fisherfolk families had recently met External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar in Delhi, and had urged him to expedite the process to release and repatriate Indian fishermen in Pakistani jails, The Indian Express reported.
They also sought that medical care be ensured for the arrested persons, and that a Joint Judicial Committee on Prisoners, which last met in October 2013, be revived. Further, the delegation demanded that confiscated Indian fishing boats should be returned and mechanisms for family distress support be set up, according to The Indian Express.
Also read: Caught for crossing invisible ocean borders, Indian and Pakistani fishermen are languishing in jail
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