Ex Indian Navy personel sentenced in Qatar released, 7 return home to India

New Delhi: In a major diplomatic win for India, Qatar releases all 8 Ex Indian Navy personel detained with them. In a press release issued by MEA, Qatar has released eight Indian Nationals detained in Qatar, 7 of them have returned to India.  

It said, 'The Government of India welcomes the release of eight Indian nationals working for the Dahra Global company who were detained in Qatar. Seven out of the eight of them have returned to India. We appreciate the decision by the Amir of the State of Qatar to enable the release and home-coming of these nationals.'

It may be recalled that these Ex Indian Navy personel were sentenced on charges of espionage by the Qatar government.

While seven sailors returned to India early Monday morning, Commander Purnendu Tiwari, whose death sentence was commuted but still received the harshest punishment of a 25-year life term, hasn’t returned yet.

Speaking to news agency ANI, one of the men who was released said, “We are happy that we have returned to India safe and sound. We would like to thank Prime Minister Modi as his personal intervention made this possible, and Amir of Qatar for allowing this to happen.”

The Indians had been working in their private capacity with Dahra Global to oversee the induction of Italian small stealth submarines U2I2. They have been identified as Captain Navtej Singh Gill, Captain Birendra Kumar Verma, Captain Saurabh Vasisht, Commander Amit Nagpal, Commander Purnendu Tiwari, Commander Sugunakar Pakala, Commander Sanjeev Gupta and Sailor Ragesh.