Pakistan chose Christmas, and the birth anniversary of its founder Mohammad Ali Jinnah as the day for the “goodwill and humanitarian gesture” to allow a meeting between captive Kulbhushan Jadhav and his mother Avantika and wife Chetana Jadhav. For the first time in 22 months since his arrest, his family members were granted such an access. The much-hyped meeting on Monday lasted for just about 40 minutes in high security.
Jadhav was at the Pakistan Foreign Office before his family arrived. The entire area had been cordoned off by police and paramilitary forces. Sharp-shooters manned the roofs of the buildings along the roads. In a crumpled blue blazer, with injury marks visible on his left ear — telltale signs of torture — 47-year-old Jadhav appeared remarkably composed.
If Jadhav’s mother and wife had hoped to hug and touch him, they were disappointed. Jadhav sat across them in a cabin behind a wall of solid glass. They could see each other and talk through intercom. And while they talked, Pakistan’s Foreign Office video recorded every bit of the conversation and body language. All along, Indian Deputy High Commissioner in Islamabad JP Singh watched from a distance. Jadhav, his wife and mother remained in his vision but he could not hear a word or talk to Jadhav.
Such was the carefully choreographed meeting between ex-Indian Navy officer Jadhav, facing death penalty in Pakistan, and his family. These were the first visuals of the Indian held in a Pakistan jail.
Pakistan Foreign Office spokesperson Dr Mohammad Faisal explained that the glass separation was for security reasons. “We did not allow physical contact during the meeting due to security reasons. Security is paramount. Indian Government was informed about the glass wall. They did not object to it. Commander Jadhav was also aware of it,” the spokesperson said.
Faisal also made it clear that presence of Indian diplomat was not a Consular Access and that this was not going to be the last meeting between Jadhav and his family. He insisted that the meeting was arranged in the light of “Islamic traditions and based on purely humanitarian grounds.”
Jadhav’s wife and mother arrived in Islamabad on Monday morning via Dubai route on a commercial flight. They were received by Indian diplomats at the airport and then taken to the Indian High Commission where the two women met the Indian envoy Ajay Bisaria. After lunch at the Embassy, Jadhav’s mother and wife were taken to the Pakistan Foreign Office in Islamabad where an area was prepared specially for this much-hyped meeting. Before the meeting, the two women underwent a thorough security check, under ISI’s eyes. From Pakistan’s side, Foreign Office Director for India Dr Fareha Bugti and spokesperson Faisal were present. After the meeting the women and the Indian diplomat left the premises amidst questions pouring from the Pakistan media. Avantika and Chetana flew out of Islamabad to India shortly after this.
All along Jadhav and his family deprived the Pakistani Government and its media of any chance for melodrama. There were no tears and strong reactions. Just calm faces from both sides. While the details of the conversations between Jadhav and his family were not available, it was evident that both sides were cautious about their conversation being monitored as they spoke. The initial time of 30 minutes allotted for the meeting was extended by 10 minutes at the request of Jadhav and his mother.
After the meeting, Pakistan Foreign Office spokesperson reiterated that Jadhav is an Indian spy who was on a mission for espionage and terrorism in Balochistan and other areas. Faisal made it obvious that Pakistan had hoped through this meeting they might be able to extract some evidence about his involvement with India’s top spying department — Research and Analysis Wing — and make his mother and wife concede that he was indeed a servicing officer of the Indian Navy. “We wanted to know whether he was getting pension or not.
We wanted to know about Anil Kumar Sinha, his handler. We wanted to know about his other passport details in which he is named as Hussain Mobarak Patel and on which he has travelled out of India 17 times. But all these questions remained unanswered as India did not allow the wife and mother to speak to anyone,” Faisal said.
Pakistan obviously wanted to collect these as evidences to submit before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) where India has filed a case saying Jadhav was kidnapped from Iran where he was working on the Chabahar port in a private capacity after retiring from Navy and was abducted from there by Pakistan security agencies. India had in May got a stay order from ICJ on the execution of death sentence awarded to Jadhav by a Pakistan military court.
The meeting proved just one thing that Jadhav is alive. Pakistani spokesperson said that his appeal for mercy is pending with higher authorities. But since Pakistan is bound by international norms, it has to wait for ICJ ruling too.