Author: Shyam Bhatia in London
Publication: Rediff on Net
Date: January 26, 2004
Family members of a British national
arrested on suspicion of assisting Naga militants say they expect him to
return home within weeks, as authorities in India have agreed to drop the
most serious charges against him.
This is the second time that Assam-
born David Ward faces deportation from India; he was last arrested in 1992
on similar charges and faced a life sentence.
Freed after the intervention of
the then British prime minister, John Major, he returned to India last
July and was arrested after he entered Nagaland without travel documents.
Security forces in Nagaland have
now dropped charges that Ward was assisting terrorists, paving the way
for his return in Edinburgh.
His brother, Michael, said he understood
Ward would agree to deportation.
"In letters to us he is now saying
it looks as if he will see us soon, and that he hoped 2004 would bring
us all together. It looks like a very positive outcome," Michael said in
a statement.
Last week, his family was told that
prosecutors had agreed not to pursue 17 of 19 charges, leaving Ward accused
only of entering Nagaland illegally.
"The system looks like it has acknowledged
that the outlandish things said about him locally were nothing more than
a game," said his brother. "He is coming home, having won a moral victory.
I am full of admiration for his resilience and glad that he has not gone
below 116lb and that he remained able to write cogent letters."
In the messages from his cell, Ward
described his work building medical dispensaries and investigating alleged
human rights abuses. He said he found evidence of massacres in two villages
and that local officials were trafficking drugs.
Ward was born in Assam to tea farmers
and first became interested in the plight of the Nagas while serving a
prison sentence for robbery in the UK.
He subsequently set up a human rights
group while still in prison and travelled to Nagaland in 1992.
Arrested after posing as a BBC journalist
with another British national, Steve Hillman, he returned to the UK following
the intercession of Major.
