Balwant Garg

Tribune News Service

Faridkot, January 5

The family members of a prisoner of war (PoW) have started a signature campaign to persuade the people to boycott the elections in this area.Annoyed with the elected MLAs and MPs for not pursuing the repatriation of Surjit Singh, a BSF seopy languishing in a Pakistani jail for the last 45 years, his family members said they wanted to tell the people that the political leaders were not serious about the lives of those who defend the country.Surjit Singh had gone missing in the 1971 Indo-Pak war. In the first week of April 2011, when some prisoners were released from Pakistan after 27 years in jail , the wife and son of Surjit Singh had came to know about his whereabouts.Amrik Singh, son of Surjit Singh, said for the last five years, the External Affairs Ministry was making just promises of getting his father released. But there was never any concrete and plausible effort at any level.“Fed up with empty promises, we have decided to launch a campaign to persuade people not to give vote to any candidate,” he added.