Kuldeep Yadav (foreground) with sister Rekha and brother Dileep. Nirmal HarindranKuldeep Yadav, 59, stares at the smartphone, trying to figure how it works. It has been seven days since Yadav returned home in Ahmedabad after 28 years of incarceration in Pakistan on espionage charges. The world around him has changed beyond his last memory.
Out of touch with his family since 2013 when Indian nationals in Pakistan prisons were subjected to different rules and separated, following Sarabjit Singh’s death, the family has been catching up with each other since Yadav came back on the night of August 25.
At home, Yadav with a lean frame, dressed in a Pathani suit, says, “I’m still getting adjusted… Had I not been picked by my family on reaching Ahmedabad, I would have been lost. I can’t recognise the streets outside our house. There are children in the family I’ve never seen before. I don’t know how these (smart) phones work and I’ve to ask Dileep (Kuldeep’s 55-year-old younger brother) every time to turn the screen on.”
Dileep adds that he last met Kuldeep during Holi in 1990.
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While Kuldeep and his family do not wish to talk of the time before his incarceraton, Gujarat HC records, based on submissions made by his sister in a petition, suggest that Yadav was “recruited by BSF for RAW military intelligence in the year 1991 at Ahmedabad… he was deputed in New Delhi and thereafter was sent to Pakistan… was arrested in Pakistan on 22.06.1994. He was interrogated for 30 months… thereafter, he was sentenced to 25-year imprisonment by Court Martial Military Court of Pakistan…”
Yadav says the sentence was imposed on October 27, 1996, and he was ideally supposed to be released on October 26, 2021. “For release of Indians from Pakistan jail, the prisoner has to provide the address of return in India on completion of imprisonment. It is checked and vetted by the Embassy and once India gives clearance, it is conveyed to the Pakistan authorities. The Supreme Court of Pakistan then gives a date for appearance of the prisoner,” according to Yadav.
“I was presented before the court on June 24, 2022, and was ordered to be released. This order is then sent to the Pakistan authorities, who send it to the Indian embassy,” he says. The paperwork kept Yadav in the jail for an additional 10 months.
Since 2013, Indian prisoners were cut off from the rest of the world. The India-Pakistan Judicial Committee on Prisoners, comprising retired judges from India and Pakistan, visited jails in Karachi, Rawalpindi and Lahore between April 26 and May 1, 2013, as well as Jinnah Hospital, Lahore, where Sarabjit was admitted following an assault by fellow inmates. Following their visit, Indian prisoners facing espionage charges were separated and housed at different cells.
“Sarabjit was a good friend but our barracks were different as he was facing death sentence. Earlier, there was a provision where a prisoner could request to meet other prisoners in 15 days… He would often ask for me. However, this changed after Sarabjit’s death… All form of correspondence stopped and I could not write any letter home… On the other side, food got better and medical facilities also improved,” he says.