Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal Thursday urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to intervene immediately to save the life of Indian national Sarabjit Singh who is facing death sentence in Pakistan.
The appeal came a day after Pakistan's Supreme Court rejected the prisoner's mercy petition on technical grounds after his lawyer failed to appear before the court.
Sarabjit Singh has been accused of triggering bomb blasts in Lahore and Multan in 1990 that left 14 people dead.
His family, in the border town of Bhikhiwind near Amritsar, 275 km from here, maintains that Sarabjit inadvertently crossed into Pakistan August 1990 in a drunken state and he is innocent.
Expressing shock and surprise, Badal wondered what Indian diplomats in Pakistan were doing if they could not ensure that Sarabjit's lawyer represented his case properly before the Supreme Court.
Badal said that, on the other hand, the Indian government had allowed 26/11 Mumbai terror attack accused Mohammed Ajmal Amir alias Kasab, who was recorded on camera killing people, the facility of engaging a lawyer to ensure fair trial.
Urging the Pakistan government to take a sympathetic view, Badal said that his government and the Akali Dal were firmly with Sarabjit's family.
Sarabjit's family members said in Bhikhiwind that they were in touch with former Pakistani federal minister and human rights activist Ansar Burney to get another appeal filed before the Supreme Court there.
"We are trying to meet top political leadership in Delhi and are pursuing the matter with Burney sahib in Pakistan. We hope we will get justice. The latest developments have brought despair to us," Sarabjit's daughter Poonam said.