The Wire Staff 
New Delhi: After being in solitary confinement for about seven months in Doha, eight Indian naval veterans there are “likely to get charged individually under various sections of the Qatari law”, says a report in The New Indian Express.
In what is a major setback, as there were hopes for early repatriation of the detained officers back to India, a source in the know of the matter is cited by the report as saying, “After the rejection of the last bail plea on March 15, for the eighth time in a row, the veterans were allowed to file a fresh petition on March 19. It was then that they were told that the charges would be framed against them individually. Based on what the charges are, the eight naval veterans will be tried in Qatari courts.”
Families of the jailed veterans are described as panic-stricken and clueless about what lies ahead. “Even though we get to meet our men – those who are not in Doha are allowed weekly phone calls – we are severely impacted by what lies ahead. We are hoping against hope that they are repatriated back home and not tried in courts there,” a family member of one of the imprisoned veterans in India is reported to have said.
While the authorities in Qatar have apparently dealt with the eight naval veterans “with civility”, the uncertainty around their release is a cause of concern.
These eight veterans in custody are Captain Navtej Singh Gill, Captain Saurabh Vashisht, Commander Purenendu Tiwari, Captain Birendra Kumar Verma, Commander Sugunakar Pakala, Commander Sanjeev Gupta, Commander Amit Nagpal and Sailor Ragesh.
The Indian government has not made many statements but conveyed that it has been in constant touch with their counterparts in Doha seeking early repatriation of the veterans.
These eight naval veterans were working for a company, Dahara Global Technologies & Consulting Services, which was meant to train Qatari Navy personnel. They had been working for the firm for five years.
On midnight of August 30, they were asked by Qatar’s interior ministry officials to accompany them for a training programme. The officials never returned home and were kept in solitary confinement, the daily reported.
The first bail plea of the jailed Indian officers was held a month after they were picked up and detained in solitary confinement. Their bail pleas have been rejected eight times since. The first consular access was given on October 3.
The chief executive of the company travelled to Doha to try and get his officials released. But the newspaper says that he also found himself in solitary confinement for two months, before being released on bail.
An earlier report said there had been concerns on why this news was not being more actively discussed, “but the incarceration of eight former Indian Navy officers in Qatar lies lost in the grey zone of bureaucracy and diplomacy.”