India has welcomed the arrest of fugitive Indian terrorist Jagtar "Tara" Singh and hopes he will be extradited soon, a source at the Indian embassy said on Wednesday.
Thai Sikhs stage a protest in front of the Indian embassy in Bangkok yesterday, calling on the Indian government to release who they say are Sikh political prisoners jailed in India. (Photo by Pattarapong Chatpattarasill)
Singh, also known as Gurmeet Singh, was arrested in Pattaya on Monday. He is wanted in India after escaping from prison where he was serving a sentence for his involvement in a 1995 bombing in Punjab, which killed 18 people including the state's chief minister.
The criminal court on Tuesday ordered that he be returned to stand trial in India. Singh will not appeal the court decision.
The Hindustan Times newspaper in India yesterday reported that relatives of the slain Punjab chief minister, Beant Singh, had also welcomed the arrest.
They told the newspaper that Jagtar Singh deserved the death penalty for his role in the assassination.
Monday's arrest also sparked a small protest outside the Indian embassy in Bangkok yesterday.
The protesters called on the Indian government to release people who they claimed were Sikh political prisoners and others they said were facing injustice.
Around a dozen protesters gathered in front of the embassy with banners demanding fair treatment for Sikhs facing "unfair trials", after being accused of crimes allegedly committed by Sikh separatists in the 1990s. One such incident includes the assassination of Beant Singh.
Even though Jagtar Singh's name was not mentioned on the banners, Indian media such as the Times of India reported that he is considered by Sikhs as a political prisoner.
The protesters outside the embassy also expressed their support for a hunger strike by Gurbaksh "Khalsa" Singh, a Sikh activist who began his fast on Nov 14 to demand the release of Sikh prisoners.
However, the embassy official denied the protest was linked to the arrest of Jagtar Singh.
Jagtar Singh was considered by Indian authorities as the leader of the Khalistan Tiger Force, a group of Sikh terrorists operating in India and Pakistan. He reportedly supplied the car used in the deadly bombing that killed the Punjab chief minister along with 17 others, including a number of soldiers and VIPs.
Jagtar Singh and the other masterminds were later arrested and jailed in Burail prison in Chandigarh. Three of them, including Singh, escaped by tunneling their way out of the high-security prison in 2004.