Appeal for release of Indian children in Pak jails

Former Madhya Pradesh education minister Aziz Qureshi has urged the centre to take up the issue during the foreign secretary-level meeting between the two countries, scheduled for March 28, and the proposed foreign minister-level talks in April.

In a letter to External Affairs Minister I K Gujral, Qureshi said these children, mostly from Gujarat, were languishing in Pakistani jails for ''unintentionally crossing the international borders'' while fishing off the Gujarat coast.

Qureshi pointed out that the children in Pakistani custody were still adolescents and if they were not released soon even their parents may fail to recognise them. Qureshi, who went to Pakistan recently to attend a wedding, said he was aghast to see the plight of these children who were serving long jail sentences without ''committing a crime''.

Qureshi said the children’s plight was brought to his notice when he visited the Ehedi welfare foundation in Karachi. He said some children in the Ehedi orphanage were just six years old. Asked by the judge of a juvenile court why he crossed the border, one six-year-old, Shaka Chala, told him that he did not see the border line on the ocean waters. He even inquired of the judge if the ocean also had been divided. Qureshi said he had held a series of meetings with a number of non-governmental organisations in Pakistan regarding these children’s release.

Submitting a list of the recent cases, Qureshi said that of the 60-odd children, taken into custody since May 1995, 20 were lodged in the Karachi central prison and 20 in the Quetta district jail.

Praising the Ehedi foundation for rendering a helping hand, Qureshi said the organisation had conveyed to the Indian authorities that it was ready to pay the air fare once the issue was resolved by the two governments.

Qureshi, in his letter, also asked Gujral, during his talks with his Pakistani cunterpart Gohar Ayub Khan, to take up the issue of reopening Pakistani consulates in Mumbai and Karachi.

Qureshi also urged for curtailing defence expenditure in the subcontinent and stressed upon free trade between the two nations.