Prime minister Keir Starmer has been urged to call for the release of jailed Briton Jagtar Singh Johal during his visit to India this week.
Sir Keir is travelling to India on Tuesday where he will meet with his counterpart Narendra Modi and promote the recently signed trade deal with the South Asian nation said to be worth £4.8bn each year to the British economy.
Mr Johal, a 38-year-old Dumbarton-based campaigner for Sikh rights, was detained in India’s northern Punjab state in 2017, just weeks after his wedding, over accusations of involvement with the banned Sikh separatist Khalistani Liberation Force.
He has denied any wrongdoing, and a UN panel has ruled that he was “arbitrarily detained” in May 2022.
Mr Johal’s family claims that he has been subjected to torture, including the administering of electric shocks, during his time in prison.
He was acquitted earlier this year in a case in which he was accused of financially supporting a terror group, but he still faces federal charges from Indian authorities.
His brother, Gurpreet Singh Johal, has repeatedly called on the British government to press the Indian authorities for his release.
Diplomacy “at the very highest level” has been “vital” in securing the release of other Britons abroad, a legal campaign group supporting his family told PA news agency. Mr Johal’s brother said the recent high-profile releases of several British citizens detained abroad provided fuel for Sir Keir to secure the same for his brother.
In September, British-Egyptian activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah was released after six years of detention in Egypt.
Elderly couple Barbie and Peter Reynolds’ detention by the Taliban – which began in February – also came to an end last month.
“I think now is the time where, genuinely, I believe that Keir Starmer has all the ammunition that he requires in order to really stand up for Jagtar and then to bring him back home,” Mr Johal’s brother said.
“I think the prime minister is the best-placed person to strongly advocate for Jagtar’s release given in eight years, no evidence has been produced. The Indians continuously prolong his detention, and if they haven’t produced the evidence in eight years, it is not likely they’re going to produce any evidence,” he added.
“Keir Starmer should be saying enough is enough, and bringing Jagtar back home.”
The British prime minister last raised Mr Johal’s case with his Indian counterpart when Mr Modi visited the UK in July.
The detained Briton is currently able to speak regularly with his family over the phone, including with his wife Gurpreet Kaur, 37.
His health is “as well as can be in an Indian jail”, according to his brother, but he faces a “mental strain” from the prolonged imprisonment.
“When the whole family’s together and Jagtar is not there, he’s always missed. And there’s always that space, that emptiness, especially when he should be back with his family,” his brother added.
Meanwhile, after more than three years, Mr Johal’s tort claim against the UK government, seeking to uncover whether British intelligence contributed to his imprisonment, was taken up in court on Monday.
His lawyers argue that his arrest and torture during Boris Johnson’s tenure as foreign secretary followed a tip-off from the UK intelligence services to their Indian counterparts, which led to his arrest.
During an investigation, MI5 passed intelligence to a liaison partner through MI6, according to a report by the Investigatory Powers Commissioner’s Office.
Though Mr Johal is not named in the report, legal action campaign group, Reprieve, says that the facts match his case due to the dates concerned, the lobbying by British prime ministers and supporting evidence detailed in the Indian press.
“The evidence that under the last government MI5 and MI6 shared intelligence about my brother with the Indian authorities, when all he had done was blog about human rights abuses, is overwhelming,” Mr Johal said.
“We didn’t expect to be put through such a lengthy ordeal in the UK, much of it in secret courts that his lawyers can’t attend, just to prove something that’s clear as day when you consider the facts. It’s draining for the whole family, when we’re already exhausted from fighting to get Jagtar home,” he added.
Reprieve has been supporting Mr Johal’s family during his detention, and also called on Sir Keir to advocate for his release during the trip.
Dan Dolan, deputy director of Reprieve, said: “It’s important to understand that Jagtar has been totally acquitted of the allegations against him after a seven-year legal process and trial, with the judge saying the prosecution had ‘miserably failed’ to produce any credible evidence.
“The reason Jagtar is still in prison is that he’s being subjected to eight duplicate cases – Kafkaesque trials based on the same allegation, the same torture ‘confession’, and almost all the same witnesses, despite these being conclusively debunked in court.”
He added: “At the present rate of hearings, the eight duplicate cases will take decades to reach a resolution. Jagtar has already lost eight years of his life to this deeply unjust process.
“We’ve seen, in other seemingly intractable situations when Brits are arbitrarily detained abroad, that what makes the difference is diplomacy at the very highest level.
“Opportunities like Sir Keir Starmer’s face-to-face meeting with Narendra Modi don’t come around very often, and it’s vital that he makes use of it, to find a way to get Jagtar home to his family.”
A Foreign Office spokesperson said: “We continue to raise concerns about Mr Johal’s prolonged detention with the Government of India at every opportunity and the Foreign Secretary will shortly meet with Mr Johal’s brother to discuss the ongoing situation.”
