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Indian serving life sentence dies at Welikada prison
View(s):An Indian national who was serving a life sentence at the Welikada Magazine Prison for possession of drugs passed away last Sunday. A post-mortem has been ordered to establish the cause of death.
Sixty-two-year-old Vellathurai Thangaraj was arrested in 2004 when Sri Lanka Navy officers patrolling the seas off the coast of Mannar searched his boat and found a stock of heroin. He was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Vavuniya High Courts on
February 1, 2004. Thangaraj had set sail from Tamil Nadu on December 24, two days before the 2004 tsunami. Sri Lanka was at war with the Tamil Tigers at the time. Relatives have asked that Vellathurai Thangaraj’s body be returned to his native village for burial. “If only India had brought back its prisoners from Sri Lanka under the prisoner exchange pact, then, perhaps, Thangaraj might be alive today,” said a statement from Indian fishermen leader U, Arulanandan of Rameshwaram.
Indian High Commission officials declined to comment.
There are more than 30 Indians serving sentences at Welikada Prison on charges ranging from drug smuggling to entering the country illegally, according to Acting Commissioner of Prisons (operations), K. M. G. B. Kulathunga,
There has been criticism recently of the conditions under which Indians are being held in Sri Lankan prisons.
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