MUZAFFARABAD, April 23: Families of AJK residents arrested by Indian troops along or across the Line of Control during the past 15 years made an impassionate appeal here on Wednesday for their immediate release. The appeal was made at a joint news conference organized for them by an NGO, Press for Peace, at a local hotel. The NGO has compiled details of such detainees and taken up the issue of their release with several authorities.

“My son had migrated from held Kashmir in 1991. One day he crossed the LoC to see some relatives and was arrested by the Indian forces,” said 70-year old Lal Begum of his son Alim Khan, currently in Central Jail Varanasi (Utter Pradesh).

Holding her son’s photo, she said he was the only breadwinner whose detention had literally devastated the family.

“I call upon the Indian leadership in the name of humanity to release him and all others who are languishing in different prisons for several years,” she said.

Two minor girls, Saleema, 7, and Saima, 4, were carrying the picture of their father Mohammad Shafi and a placard reading: “Uncle Musharraf and Uncle Manmohan please let our father be back with us.”

According to Mr Shafi’s wife Amrina, he was arrested by three Indian soldiers in 2001, as he was offering prayers along the LoC in a Neelum valley village.

“Since then we have no information about him,” said Ms Amrina, accompanied by her parents in law.

Sakina Bibi, 75, also resident of Neelum valley, said her son Sakhawat Hussain was arrested by Indian troops as he went to cut fodder along the LoC five years ago.

The detainee’s 14-year-old son Abdul Razzaq said he and his other siblings badly missed their father.

“Gen Musharraf should do something so that our father is back with us,” he said.

Sabir Ali and his wife Salima Bibi broke into tears when they spoke of their son Jafar, who was only 17 when he crossed the LoC in 1993, to see his uncle on the other side.