Senior advocate and former Solicitor General of India said that India tried to persuade Pakistan through back channels and bring back Kulbhushan Jadhav who was sentenced to death by a Pakistan Military Court in 2017 on charges of espionage and terrorism. Harish Salve was the lead counsel for India at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in the Kulbhushan Jadhav case.
In an online lecture organized by Akhil Bharatiya Adhivakta Parishad, affiliated to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, he said that India has been consistently nudging Pakistan about how they plan to go about with the ICJ judgement to which Pakistan has not yet given any satisfactory response. The ICJ in 2018 had ruled that Pakistan should review Kulbhushan Jadhav’s death sentence after a closed trial.
“We were hoping that they will let him go. They haven’t”, he said. He added that it has become a big ego problem in Pakistan. He mentioned that India had written 4-5 letters which Pakistan kept turning down. He said that India has now reached a point where it should decide whether to go back to ICJ for consequential directions as Pakistan has not responded positively. Mr Salve also said that Pakistan had granted consular access after the ICJ verdict but it was too late.
Mr. Salve also referred to the obscene language used by Pakistan at the ICJ. He said that he didn’t wish to stoop to such lows as Indian traditions did not allow him to behave such way and that he respected the ICJ’s forum. “By the time of the rejoinder argument, the Pakistan lawyer was apologetic for the language used”, he said.