New Delhi urges Islamabad to show sympathy to Sarabjeet Singh

New Delhi, June 25 (ANI): External Affairs Minister S.M Krishna has urged Islamabad to show sympathy to Indian prisoner Sarabjeet Singh after Pakistan's Supreme Court rejected his mercy plea and upheld the death sentence in his alleged involvement in the Lahore bomb attacks in 1990.

"We have consistently urged the government of Pakistan to take a sympathetic and humanitarian view in this case. It is our hope that they will find it possible to do so," Krishna told reporters here on Wednesday.

Earlier on Wednesday, a three-member bench led by Justice Raja Fayyaz Ahmed dismissed Sarabjit's review petition on the grounds of non-pursuance of the case by his lawyer.

Sarabjit's counsel had failed to appear in court for the past few hearings, including the last one on Monday.

Rana Abdul Hamid, the lawyer who was representing Sarabjit, had been unable to appear in court after he was appointed last year an additional advocate general by Punjab province.

Sarabjit Singh is a resident of Amritsar in Punjab. He was arrested near the Kasur border in Pakistan in August 1990. As per his family, he had actually strayed into Pakistan's territory in an inebriated state.

He was awarded death sentence by a Lahore anti-terrorism court in October 1991 for allegedly carrying out serial bomb blasts in Pakistan.

Sarabjit challenged the verdict in the Supreme Court, however, the apex court quashed his appeal in September 2005, saying that the review petition was not filed within the time period as mentioned in the law. (ANI)