India on Thursday rebuffed Pakistan for carrying out “propagandistic exercises” by putting out “coerced” statements by Kulbhushan Jadhav on video, and said such actions by Islamabad carry no credibility.
The hard-hitting response by India came after the Pakistan foreign ministry put out a video of Jadhav in which the 47-year-old Indian is purportedly asking India why it was “lying” that he was not working for an intelligence agency.
In the purported video, Jadhav also said, “I saw fear in her (mother’s) eyes, the Indian diplomat was shouting at my mother the moment she stepped out. I saw him shouting, yelling at her. This [meeting] was a positive gesture, so that she [my mother] could be happy and I could be happy.”
However, it was not clear how Jadhav saw the diplomat shouting at his mother once she stepped out. The diplomat accompanying Jadhav’s family was India’s deputy high commissioner in Islamabad.
“This does not come as a surprise. Pakistan is simply continuing its practice of putting out coerced statements on video. It is time for them to realise that such propagandistic exercises simply carry no credibility,” external affairs ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said.
Jadhav also claimed in the video that the Pakistan government was taking good care of him.
Reacting sharply, Kumar said, “The absurdity of a captive under duress certifying his own welfare while mouthing allegations of his captors clearly merits no comment.”
He also said that Pakistan is best advised to fulfil its international obligations, whether it pertains to consular relations or United Nations Security Council resolutions 1267 and 1373 on terrorism, and to desist from continuing violations of human rights of an Indian national.
The video was released days after India had hit out at Pakistan for violating understandings over the Jadhav-family meet and raised questions about the Indian national’s well being.
India had also asserted that Jadhav appeared coerced and under considerable stress during the tightly-controlled interaction on December 25 at the Pakistan foreign office.
During the meeting, whose pictures were released by Pakistan, Jadhav was seen sitting behind a glass screen while his mother and wife sat on the other side. They spoke through an intercom device and the entire 40-minute proceedings appeared to have been recorded on video.
