After Sarabjit blunder, Pak to release Surjeet today

New Delhi: Indian prisoner Surjeet Singh, who has served a life term following his arrest on charges of spying in the 1980s, is set to return home on Thursday after 31 long years. Pakistani policemen will escort the 69-year old to the Wagah border, where he will be handed over to Indian authorities.

Surjeet Singh will be released from Kot Lakhpat Jail in Lahore at 10 am on Thursday, a senior official of the prison department of Punjab province said.

Awais Sheikh, the counsel for Singh, told the media that the Indian national was arrested by Pakistani police on charges of spying during the regime of military ruler Zia-ul-Haq.

Pakistani policemen will escort the 69-year old to the Wagah border, where he will be handed over to Indian authorities.

Singh was given the death sentence under the Pakistan Army Act in 1985. The death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in 1989 by then President Ghulam Ishaq Khan.

Sources said Singh had held meetings with other prisoners in Kot Lakhpat Jail on Wednesday to bid them farewell.

He also requested the authorities to serve him 'sewai' to celebrate his impending release, the sources said.

Singh is expected to be repatriated along with 315 Indian fishermen who were on Wednesday freed from a jail in the southern port city of Karachi. The fishermen were released as a goodwill gesture, officials said.

Hours after reports emerged on Wednesday that Pakistan was to free Indian death row prisoner Sarabjit Singh, the presidential spokesman clarified that authorities had actually ordered the release of Surjeet and not Sarabjit.

(With additional inputs from PTI)

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