Indian prisoner returns from Pakistan after 27 years (Lead, Changing dateline)
April 7th, 2011 - 3:54 pm ICT by IANS
Attari (Punjab), April 7 (IANS) Gopal Dass, an Indian prisoner who had been in a Pakistani jail for 27 years, returned home Thursday afternoon.
Dass, 50, who had been arrested in Pakistan in 1984 and had spent the long years since in a Lahore jail, waved to waiting family members as he crossed the iron border gates at this road border checkpost, about 30 km from Amritsar.
Addressing reporters, he criticised the government for not doing enough for Indian prisoners jailed in Pakistan.
Authorities in Pakistan had earlier Thursday released him from Lahore’s Central Jail where he was serving his term on charges of spying.
He was set to be released by the end of this year under the law. However, on March 27, Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari announced his release on humanitarian grounds - just ahead of Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani’s visit to Mohali, near Chandigarh, to watch the March 30 India-Pakistan World Cup semifinal on an invitation from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
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