The foreign ministry confirmed that two Indians namely- Satwinder Kumar of Hoshiarpur and Harjeet Singh of Ludhiana, have been beheaded in Saudi Arabia on the account of murdering a fellow Indian. Sources have confirmed that two were executed on February 28 this year.
The Indian embassy in Riyadh was not informed by the Saudi authorities before the executions. One more point is that the families of the deceased may not get the dead bodies because of rules against it.
Harjeet and Satwinder killed Imamuddin after a fight broke out between them over the distribution of some money they had looted. After a few days, the two were detained by the cops for drinking liquor and fighting. While deportation formalities were being done, they were identified to be associated with the murder.
The details of the fate of Satwinder Kumar and Harjeet Singh were disclosed by the foreign ministry in the wake of a petition that was filed by Satwinder’s wife Seema Rani. In the letter, delivered to Seema on Monday, it was learnt that Satwinder and Harjeet were arrested on December 9, 2015, for allegedly murdering Arif Imamuddin.
“They were shifted to Riyadh jail for trial and they confessed to their crime. The hearing of their case on May 31, 2017 was attended by an embassy official. At that time, the case file was transferred to an appeals court, with an additional charge of ‘hirabha (highway robbery that also invites capital punishment)’,” as per the MEA
The letter which was signed by Prakash Chand, director (consular) said, adding that embassy officials used to visit the jail to know more about the status of their trial. “But, both were executed on February 28, 2019, without informing the embassy.
Several communications were made to the ministry of foreign affairs, Saudi Arabia, to get the mortal remains but Saudi system does not permit handing over the bodies of those executed to the embassy,” the letter said.