The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Thursday started examining Baloch leader Brahamdagh Bugti’s request seeking political asylum in India.
The request was forwarded by the Ministry of External Affairs to MHA, official sources said. The final call on the plea, which was filed by Bugti at the Permanent Indian Mission in Geneva on Tuesday, will be taken by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The last time India granted an asylum request was in 1959 to the Dalai Lama. Bugti, who fled Pakistan to Geneva via Afghanistan in 2010, is presently based in Switzerland where he runs his Baloch Republican Party, but without official authorisation from the Swiss government.
Sources said Bugti, grandson of Nawab Akbar Bugti, a Baloch nationalist leader killed by the Pakistani army in 2006, will have to undergo verification before he is granted an Indian ID card and travel papers.
Published 22 September 2016, 20:34 IST