“premeditated murder”

likely to be further strained

Pakistan sentences alleged Indian spy Kulbhushan Jadhav to death

ISLAMABAD/NEW DELHI: India declared on Monday a Pakistani military court’s decision to award death sentence to Indian national Kulbhushan Jadhav on charges of spying, virtually snuffing out any prospect of a thaw in bilateral ties.Ties are, in fact,with India viewing the Pakistani decision as farcical.Foreign secretary S Jaishankar made India’s outrage evident by summoning Pakistani high commissioner Abdul Basit to protest the death sentence handed out by a secret court.Indian sources suspect that Jadhav, a retired Indian Navy personnel, was “snatched” by Pakistani agencies last year from Iran . His subsequent presence in Pakistan was never credibly explained.The Iranian government had also said that Jadhav, who was in that country, was not engaged in any illegal activity.“Senior Pakistani figures have themselves cast doubt about the adequacy of evidence. The claim in the Inter-Services Public Relations release that Jadhav was provided with a defending officer during the so-called trial is clearly absurd in the circumstances,” the government said.The reference was to former Pakistani NSA Sartaj Aziz telling the Pakistan Senate that there was nothing beyond statements against Jadhav.“If this sentence against an Indian citizen, awarded without observing basic norms of law and justice, is carried out, the government and people of India will regard it as a case of premeditated murder,” Jaishankar told Basit.Jadhav, who Pakistan claims was holding an alias as Hussein Mubarak Patel, was arrested on March 3, 2016 through what Islamabad said was a counter-intelligence operation in Balochistan’s Mashkel.Pakistan army’s media arm has said that Jadhav was arrested for alleged involvement in espionage and sabotage activities against that country. Following his arrest, Islamabad had released a video in which Jadhav was shown purportedly admitting his involvement in spying.Between March 25, 2016 and March 31, 2017, India had issued as many as 13 notes verbale for consular access to Jadhav but did not get any response from Islamabad.Pakistan, in fact, only sent a letter of assistance to India seeking help from Indian authorities to probe “charges” against him.“The proceedings that have led to the sentence against Jadhav are farcical in the absence of any credible evidence against him,” the government said in a statement, adding that it was significant that India's high commissioner had not even been informed that Jadhav was being brought to trial.Aziz had been quoted as saying before the Pakistan Senate that there was “insufficient” evidence to prove terror charges against Jadhav.Aziz had said the dossier on Jadhav contained “mere statements” and lacked any “conclusive evidence”. He had called for more “matter” on the “spy”.While Pakistan claimed that Jadhav was a commander-rank officer with Indian Navy, India said he retired from the Navy in 2002 and had nothing to do with the Indian government. Jadhav’s family has also said he was not a serving officer any more.“We don’t believe he is a spy because had he been one, he wouldn’t have been carrying an Indian passport,” said a source here. Jadav’s Indian passport was in the name of Hussein Mubarak Patel.It is also interesting that Islamabad had disclosed Jadhav’s arrest last year days before a Pakistani team visited Pathankot to investigate the attack on the airbase.India acknowledged that Jadhav had worked with the Navy in the past and it insisted he had nothing to do with the government. India believes that Jadhav might have been a businessman operating out of Chabahar in Iran.In an interesting twist to the case, former German ambassador to Pakistan Gunter Mulack claimed to have information that Jadhav had been abducted by Taliban from near the Balochistan-Afghanistan border and later “sold” to ISI.India believes that by denying it consular access to Jadhav, Pakistan acted in violation of the Vienna Convention on consular relations which says “consular officers shall have the right to visit a national of the sending state (India) who is in prison, custody or detention, to converse and correspond with him and to arrange for his legal representation”.Islamabad used the arrest of Jadhav to claim “evidence” that India’s external intelligence agency RAW was fomenting terrorism in Balochistan. It has repeatedly briefed envoys of EU and P-5 nations about Jadhav’s “subversive activities” in Balochistan.