Political pressure to bring Jagtar Singh Johal back home increases following 7th anniversary of arbitrary detention in an Indian jail

A week ago Jagtar Singh Johal’s brother Gurpreet Singh Johal, a Labour councillor in Scotland and his Labour MP Douglas McAllister from West Dunbartonshire met David Lammy, the Foreign Secretary to discuss the release and return of Jagtar Singh Johal to be with his family in Scotland.

After the meeting Gurpreet Singh Johal said the meeting was positive and expressed hope that the Labour Government would do “what is right”.  David Lammy unlike his predecessors listened to what they had to say and the solutions that were proposed to get Jagtar released and back to Dumbarton. 

On the following day Gurpreet met Scottish Labour MPs who agreed to write to the Prime Minister to get Jagtar released and back home.  Monday marked the 7th anniversary of the torture and arbitrary detention of Jagtar when the letter from Scottish Labour MPs was delivered to Keir Starmer.  

The letter was signed by 16 Scottish MPs including the chairman of the Scottish Affairs Select Committee Patricia Ferguson (Glasgow West), Euan Stainbank (Falkirk) and Katrina Murray (Cumbernauld and Kirkintilloch).

The letter stated: “Jagtar has had seven years of his life cruelly stolen from him… we urge you to send a message about the priority that your Government places on protecting its citizens from abuse abroad. We ask you to make securing Jagtar’s release a priority, and ensure your Government does whatever it takes to bring him home to his family in Dumbarton.”

The Sikh Federation (UK) submitted a Parliamentary e-petition last week titled “Securing the immediate release and return of Jagtar Singh Johal” expecting it to be approved and for it to go live this week coinciding with the 7th anniversary.  

It read: “It is widely accepted that British national Jagtar Singh Johal was tortured to sign a blank confession, has no chance of a fair trial and arbitrarily detained without conviction in an Indian jail for more than 7 years. The UK Government must secure Jagtar’s immediate release and return to the UK.

Keir Starmer and David Lammy accept Jagtar was arrested on 4 November 2017 after travelling to India for his wedding where he was tortured by Indian police officers into making a so-called confession to charges carrying the death penalty. 

Jagtar was targeted because of his political activism and an expert UN panel concluded in May 2022 that he has been tortured, denied the right to a fair trial and he should be immediately released as there is no legal basis for his continued detention.”

The Sikh Federation (UK) is confident when the e-petition goes live of getting over 10,000 signatures from constituents within two weeks covering hundreds of MPs that will require the UK Government to provide a written response.

Our target is to get over 100,000 signatures covering all 650 MPs in the 6 month window and securing a debate in Parliament on the treatment of Jagtar Singh Johal and what the UK Government is doing to secure his release and return home.

Dabinderjit Singh OBE, the Sikh Federation’s Lead Executive for Political Engagement said: “We were gearing up for the e-petition this week, but were shocked when the Parliamentary Petition Team yesterday rejected the e-petition for Jagtar Singh Johal by ridiculously arguing it calls for an action relating to a particular individual, or organisation outside of the UK” for which the UK Government or Parliament were not responsible.

We immediately pushed back and successfully argued Jagtar Singh Johal is a British national in arbitrary detention in an Indian jail for which the UK Government and Parliament are responsible.” 

He added: “However, the Petitions Team  then argued the petition was rejected under our ‘Individual Case’ rule stating:  I’m sorry but we can’t accept petitions which call for actions with regard to named individuals, even if they are something the Government could be responsible for.”

We went back to the Petitions Team yesterday giving them half a dozen examples of e-petitions approved relating to individuals and also said if the ‘individual case’ rule has been recently introduced we could introduce a more generic e-petition titled: Securing the immediate release and return of British nationals arbitrarily detained in Indian jails.”

We have not heard back from the Petitions Team, but made them aware that Jagtar’s MP, Douglas McAllister raised his case at Prime Minister Questions earlier today.”

Douglas McAllister asked Keir Starmer: “Monday of this week marked the seven-year anniversary of my constituent Jagtar Singh Johal’s arbitrary detention in India. Can the Prime Minister assure me that he and his Government will do all they can to secure Jagtar’s immediate release and bring him home?”

Keir Starmer replied: “Yes. We are committed to pushing the Government of India on this important case. The Foreign Secretary has raised it and will continue to do so, and we will ensure that we speak to my hon. Friend as we do so.”

We will wait 48 hours to see if the Parliamentary authorities will allow the specific or generic e-petition, but have decided this should be backed up by a mass letter writing campaign for Jagtar Singh Johal that is to be launched later this month.  

Our aim is to appeal to hundreds of MPs across the political spectrum to pressure Keir Starmer and David Lammy; Dozens of MPs are expected to receive hundreds of letters from constituents.