New Delhi, November 28
A cloud of suspense continues to hover over the fate of 39 Indians kidnapped by ISIS militants in Iraq over five months ago with the government today saying it didn’t have direct evidence of either their death or survival.

The government, however, said it would continue to search for the missing as bulk indirect evidence surfacing from Iraq points to the fact that they are alive. A majority of those missing are from Punjab and the rest from Kolkata.

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, while addressing concerns of members over the fate of the missing persons, said in the Lok Sabha today that while there was only one source which was claiming that the 39 persons have been killed, there as many as six sources saying that they were alive.

Rejecting the contention of Congress MP Jyotiraditya Scindia that the government was misleading the country on the fate of the missing persons kidnapped from Iraq’s Mosul in mid June, Sushma said the allegation was baseless and the government was trying day in and day out to trace the missing.

She said there was a source of the news that 39 persons have been killed. That source is Harjit Masih, now in the protective custody of the Government of India.

"Harjit Masih has, in his account, said that on June 15 ISIS militants kidnapped some Indians and Bangladeshis whom they later separated into two groups. According to Masih, the Indian group was taken to a forest and shot dead while he escaped. There are discrepancies in his account. Clearly, I had the easier option of believing him and abandoning the search for the missing. But I decided to continue the search believing six sources, including Red Crescent organization which have repeatedly told us that these people are alive,” Sushma told the Lok Sabha where MPs, including AAP’s Bhagwant Mann, raised concerns on the issue which resonated in the Rajya Sabha also.

Sushma said the indirect evidence supporting the survival of 39 missing Indians is in the form of written letters which she has shared with her Cabinet colleagues Arun Jaitley and Harsimrat Badal, MP from Bathinda. The minister urged the House to respect the need for secrecy in the rescue mission, saying “secrecy is important for the success of such operations”.

The minister said she was not in direct touch with anyone but six sources had told the government that 39 Indians were alive. "This message comes daily and not in fits and starts. We have even deputed an officer in Iraq to coordinate the search,” Sushma said adding that the government was working in “extremely trying circumstances to trace its people”.

“Mosul is under the control of militants. They are not the government and the government there is not in control. So you can understand the odds we are facing. Why would we mislead anyone?,” Swaraj asked Scindia.

She rejected as “hearsay evidence” the claims that the missing Indians are dead seeking support of Parliament for government’s continued search operations.

Earlier, the Congress accused the government of misleading Parliament about the fate of the missing Indians on several occasions.

Indirect evidence

Sushma says there is indirect evidence supporting the survival of 39 missing Indians

This was in the form of written letters

These she has shared with her Cabinet colleagues Arun Jaitley and Harsimrat Badal

Sushma urged the House to respect secrecy in the rescue mission saying “secrecy is important for the success of such operations”

M’rashtra youth who joined IS returns home