Indian prisoner Sarabjit Singh was on Friday brutally attacked by inmates at the Lahore’s Kot Lakhpat jail. According to reports, the death row convict was attacked with bricks and knives. He has been shifted to the Jinnah Hospital, where he was said to be regained consciousness, after being in coma.
Official sources said here that the Indian high commission in Islamabad has got in touch with the Pakistani foreign office as well as the Presidency to find out the details of the attack. It has also requested them to provide all medical and other assistance to Sarabjit, who was convicted for his alleged involved in a series of bombings in Pakistan Punjab in 1990, that killed 14 people.
According to Ministry of External Affairs’ official spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin Pakistan has informed New Delhi that medical condition of Sarabjit was serious but doctors were working round-the-clock to save him. Two officials of the Indian High Commission in Islamabad would be reaching the Lahore hospital by late night.
As per Pakistani media reports, Sarabjit was having tea with inmates Muhammad Muddasar and Amir, also under death sentence, who exchanged hot words with him and attacked him.
In Amritsar, his sister Dalbir Kaur claimed that the attack was in revenge for the hanging of Afzal Guru. “They (inmates) were threatening him of dire consequences and aggressive since the hanging of Afzal Guru,” she said, demanding permission to visit her brother. Union Minister of State for External Affairs Preneet Kaur assured that Dalbir Kaur would be given assistance to see her brother.
Ironically, on the day of the attack, retired Justice A S Gill and M A Khan arrived as members of the judicial committee on prisoners on a scheduled visit to Lahore.They are scheduled to be in Pakistan till May 1 and visit jails in Karachi, Rawalpindi and Lahore.