Sunil Masih spent eight years in a jail in Pakistan for alleged spying. He was beaten up every day and given electric shocks till he passed out. “I was treated worse than an animal,” he recalls.
As India tries to secure the release of Kulbhushan Jadhav, the retired Navy officer sentenced to death in Pakistan for alleged spying, Hindustan Times spoke to three men in a Punjab village who were jailed in that country for espionage. They say the torture they faced still traumatises them but being ignored by the Indian government hurts too.
Sunil, 70, was caught in Pakistan in 1999 and returned to Dadwan village in Gurdaspur district in 2007 after spending time in at five jails.
“Initially, they took me to Gora jail in Sialkot where I was given third degree by the Pakistani Army officials,” he says speaking about the torture he faced.
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“I, along with other Indian prisoners, was given worse treatment than an animal gets. Electric currents and beatings until we got unconscious were routine business. Later, when we accepted everything (spying), we are taken from one jail to another. During my eight years of imprisonment, I was kept at Rawalpindi, Faisalabad, Lahore, Peshawar jails. In 2007, I came back to India along with 17 other prisoners via the Wagah border.”
Sunil says the Indian government didn’t help him when he returned to the country.
(From left) Sunil, David and Daniel Mashi
David Maish, 55, says he spied for India but intelligence agencies dumped him when he returned after being imprisoned and tortured in Pakistan. David went to Pakistan for the first time in July 1993 and was caught by Pakistani army in 1999.
“I was given Rs 3,000 for every assignment. In September 1999, I was caught while crossing the border and sent to Gora jail. We were hung up and tortured like slaves. There are 37 cells in Gora jail where the Pakistan Army interrogates prisoners”.
“After coming back in December 2006, I kept fighting to get recognition and compensation for my sacrifice but my entire request put no heed on deaf ears of agency officials,” says David.
Daniel Masih, who is in his 40s, says he made seven trips to Pakistan as a spy in 1992. He was arrested in 1993 near the border along Punjab’s Gurdaspur district and sentenced to four years in prison. “During my imprisonment in Gora jail, there were around 150 Indian prisoners out of which one dozen had gone mad after bearing the torture of the Pakistani army” says Daniel.
Source: HindustanTimes