Eight Years of Injustice: Bring Jagtar Home

Today marks eight years since Jagtar Singh Johal, a British citizen from Dumbarton, Scotland, was violently arrested by authorities in Jalandhar, northern India. Plainclothes officials hooded him on a crowded street and forced him into an unmarked police car — without a warrant. He has been separated from his family ever since, facing a possible death sentence on charges based on a “confession” extracted under torture. 

Jagtar was in India to get married. It should have been one of the happiest moments of his life. Instead, it marked the beginning of a nightmare – he was tortured and has endured eight years of detention – which the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has concluded “lacks legal basis and is arbitrary” – and hundreds of court hearings in which prosecutors have failed to produce any credible evidence against him.  

Lack of reliable evidence against him 

In the first case against him to reach a verdict, in March 2025, Jagtar was acquitted of all charges by the Moga District Court in Punjab. The court found that prosecutors had failed to present any reliable evidence despite having had over seven years to develop their case, stating they had “miserably failed to prove” that he had committed any of the alleged offences. 

Since this acquittal, Jagtar’s prison conditions have worsened. He is held in almost total solitary confinement, with minimal contact with other prisoners, and is subjected to frequent searches of his cell. 

Trials in India’s National Investigation Agency courts often take decades to reach a verdict. As some of our clients know from painful experience, the psychological toll of indefinite detention can itself amount to torture. 

Economic ties ahead of human rights concerns 

There have been five UK Prime Ministers since Jagtar was first detained – all of whom have so far failed to secure his release. Ministers in the previous government claimed to have raised Jagtar’s case more than 100 times with their Indian counterparts, but to no avail. 

Meanwhile, the UK continues to deepen its economic ties with India, signing a new trade deal in May this year. REDRESS wrote to Prime Minister Keir Starmer ahead of his first visit to India last October, urging him to make clear to Prime Minister Narendra Modi that allied nations do not treat each other’s citizens this way — and that what happens to Jagtar will have long-lasting consequences. 

The UK must now find a way to secure Jagtar’s release. As seen most recently with the release of Alaa Abd el-Fattah from detention in Egypt, diplomatic intervention at the highest level can make the difference in cases of arbitrary detention.  

Alaa’s sisters were amongst a group of survivors of arbitrary detention and their family members who recently urged Keir Starmer to call for Jagtar’s release during his trip to India in October. The letter was also signed by Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who was arbitrarily detained in Iran for six years, and her husband, Richard Ratcliffe; Matthew Hedges, a British academic formerly detained in the United Arab Emirates, and his partner, Daniela Tejada. 

The UK must now apply all the diplomatic leverage at its disposal to bring Jagtar back home to his family in Dumbarton. 

We cannot remain indifferent. Please share this story with your networks so Jagtar is not forgotten until this injustice ends. 

Photo: Jagtar and his wife at their wedding.