Pakistan to release 100 Indian fishermen on April 8

 Pakistan will be releasing 100 Indian fishermen in its custody on Monday. According to the ministry of external affairs,  385 Indian fishermen are in Pakistani custody. The development comes in the backdrop of New Delhi sending a note verbale to Pakistan high commission on Tuesday calling for the release of the fishermen who have completed their sentences. 

Since 2014, the Indian Government has been able to secure the release of 1749 Indian prisoners, including 1725 fishermen along with 57 boats.In December 2018, Pakistan released Indian Citizen Hamid Nehal Ansari after 6 years in jail. Hamid Nehal was arrested by Pakistani authorities in 2012 after he was found with a fake passport. He had gone to Pakistan via Afghanistan on a fake passport to meet a girl he befriended on Facebook.

It was followed by the release of 2 Pakistani nationals by India--Imran Warsi and Abdullah Shah. Imran Wari had come to India in 2004 on a valid visa but overstayed after marrying an Indian girl who he loved. He was caught after trying to make a fake passport in Bhopal and released in 2018, after 10 years in jail. Shah, an autistic from Swat, crossed over to India to meet Shah Rukh Khan in 2017.

In October 2017, India had suggested Pakistan that the two sides could work together for the release and repatriation of elderly, women and mentally unsound prisoners on humanitarian grounds and proposed to revive the mechanism of Joint Judicial Committee.

In the past 6 months, the ministry of external affairs via--3 note verbale, one on 1 January, other in December and November last year-- had called on Islamabad to organise an early visit of Joint Judicial Committee to Pakistan but it has got no response. Most of the fishermen are from Gujarat while a few are from UP.