“We have appealed to the Pakistan government and we hope that Pakistan will listen to our appeal. Nobody will be released in exchange,” Minister of State for Home Sriprakash Jaiswal said in Delhi, when asked if there is any move for swapping prisoners.

Jaiswal however said if any Pakistani prisoner can be “lawfully” set free then it will be done. Sources in the Pakistan administration said in Islamabad that the authorities concerned with Sarabjit’s case had decided that it would be best for the issue to be “put on hold” till the new government is formed by the Pakistan People’s Party and its allies.

A statement issued by the Indian High Commission in Islamabad meanwhile said: “The reprieve now allows time for the appeals for clemency to be given proper consideration from all angles, including by the new government expected to take office in Pakistan soon.”

The High Commission statement hoped that Sarabjit, who is on death row for alleged involvement in terrorist attacks, would be granted clemency on humanitarian grounds after President Pervez Musharraf on Wednesday deferred the hanging scheduled for April 1, by a month.

DON’T PLAY POLITICS: ASMA
New Delhi, DHNS: Expressing concern about the rising religious intolerance in India noted Pakistani human rights activist and UN Special Rapporteur Asma Jahangir said on Thursday that the country runs a real risk of recurrence of large-scale communal violence unless political exploitation of communal tensions were effectively prevented.

“Religious intolerance has risen and religious identities have become sharper in India in the last 10 years as communalisation of politics is evident,” she told reporters here at the end of her India visit as the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief. “There is today a real risk that Ayodhya-like communal violence might happen again in India unless incitement to religious hatred and political exploitation of communal tensions are effectively prevented,” she said.

Ms Jahangir said India and Pakistan should not play politics over the lives of prisoners.