A Delhi court will on Monday rule on two Sikh separatists who are charged with treason for hijacking an Air India plane in 1981 and commandeering it to Lahore in Pakistan.
Tajinder Pal Singh and Satnam Singh were charged with waging war against India and sedition when they were deported to India in 2000 after serving life terms in Pakistan.
The plane carrying 111 passengers and a crew of six was hijacked on September 29, 1981 by five knife-wielding Khalistan supporters. In Lahore, Pakistani commandos captured the separatists and freed 45 hostages remaining aboard unharmed the next day. The hijackers had first released more than 60 of the passengers.
Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh had last year directed the state’s Legal Aid Team to extend help to the two men. “While the hijacking was condemnable, any attempt to prosecute the two, who had already done life terms in Pakistan for the same crime, will amount to a serious travesty of justice,” he had said in a statement.