I Kept Saying All 39 Indians Were Dead: Lone Survivor Harjit Masih

Harjit Masih is the only one of 40 Indians kidnapped by the ISIS in June 2014 to have returned to India.

(Photo: Siddharth Safaya/The Quint)

Harjit Masih, the lone survivor who had managed to flee from ISIS captivity in Iraq in June 2014 following his abduction along with 39 other Indians there, said he had been maintaining for the last three years that all others had been killed.

I had been saying for the last three years that all 39 Indians had been killed (by ISIS militants).

Harjit Masih

"I had spoken the truth," asserted Masih, resident of village Kala Afghana in Gurdaspur district of Punjab.

Masih was one of the 40 Indian workers abducted by ISIS militant outfit.

His statement came after External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on 20 March informed the Parliament that all the 39 Indian workers, abducted by ISIS in Iraq nearly three years ago, were killed and their bodies have been recovered.

Masih said they were killed in front of his eyes and and was wondering why the government was not accepting what he had said earlier.

Masih said that the Indians were working at a factory in Iraq in 2014. "But we were kidnapped by militants and kept hostage for some days," he said.

Responding to his claims at a press conference in New Delhi, EAM Sushma Swaraj said, “Harjit Masih is just an individual, he could claim 39 others are dead, but we are the government, we can't say this so easily. We have to be responsible.”

On the fateful day, Masih said they were made to sit on their knees and the militants then opened fire upon them.

I was fortunate to have survived, though a bullet hit my thigh and I fell unconscious.

Harjit Masih

He, however, managed to return to India after giving a slip to the ISIS militants.

As many as 39 Indians, who had gone to Iraq to earn their livelihood, had been missing since 2014.

Out of the deceased, 27 people were from Punjab, 6 from Bihar, 4 from Himachal Pradesh and 2 from West Bengal. The identity of one of them is yet to be verified, EAM Sushma Swaraj said at the press conference.