Dabgari, Pakistan:
Five Sikh men who fled their hometown on the Afghan border were makinga quick trip back home when masked men blocked their way with a pickupon a mountain road not far from the Khyber Pass. The kidnappers coveredtheir faces with black scarves and carried machine-guns.
Surjeet Singh had just wanted to check on the small grocery store hehad left behind in Dabori, the Pakistani town he fled a year ago whenit was overrun with Taliban fighters and the government launched abombing campaign against them. Singh and the four friends travellingwith him that day all wore the carefully wrapped turbans that madetheir Sikh religion clear. They were going back to pick up money theywere owed, or to check on their businesses. They had called friendsahead of time to check on the situation. They thought a quick tripwould be safe.
As the armed men swarmed toward their car, two of them managed to slipaway amid the chaos, but three - all sharing the same common Sikhsurname, Singh - were quickly captured. After hours of walking, theywere brought to a set of rooms carved into the mountainside. It wouldbe their home for the next 42 days. There they would be kept chainedand often blindfolded. Occasionally, they were beaten.
The prisoners never saw their captors' faces - which were alwayscovered with scarves - and even now they do not know who they were."The government started an operation and rescued us, but I was injuredin the rescue operation. The soldiers brought us to the CMH (CombinedMilitary Hospital) and they were very good to us," Singh said. He isnow recovering from a bullet wound in a small apartment in the crowdedmaze-like neighbourhood of Dabgari in Peshawar, the largest city inPakistan's northwest.
The Khyber region, an area torn by Islamist militant violence, isbecoming an increasingly dangerous place for a non-Muslim, residentssay. "Before, we were not afraid to live in our homes (in Khyberregion). But as the situation became worse and the government forcesstarted bombing the area, there were a lot of Taliban fighters. So wemoved from there and came to the Peshawar area about a year ago," saidSingh.
In a country beset by a powerful Islamist insurgency, where suicidebombings are commonplace and government offensives widely dismissed asineffective, anyone can become a victim. But for the nation'sminorities - its small communities of Hindus, Christians and Sikhs -life is particularly precarious. Thousands have fled their villages,crowding into urban slums. Thousands more have fled the country.
Singh's journey, which began on a cold morning in January and ended 42days later with a March 1 bloody gunbattle, underscores the threats tothose minorities, as well as the lawlessness of Pakistan's frontierregions. Two months later, it's still not clear exactly why the Sikhswere targeted: Were the bandits waiting for them? Would they havekidnapped anyone who came by?
The kidnappers forcibly cut their prisoners' hair. Keeping hair uncutis a deeply important religious precept for Sikh men. But the realreason for the kidnapping was quickly clear: money. Surjeet Singh didnot want to talk about ransom demands but the other survivor,18-year-old Gurvinder Singh, told the a newspaper that their captorsbrought them mobile phones on their first morning in the cave.
They were ordered to call their families and say their freedom wouldcost 50 (m) million rupees, or about 600-thousand US dollars. When itwas clear that money could not be raised, the number dropped to 20 (m)million rupees, or 240-thousand US dollars. After that: nothing. Themen made no further phone calls, their captors barely spoke to them.Their days passed in silence.
After a few weeks, the third of the trio, Jaspal Singh was suddenlytaken away. The other Sikhs were told he'd been freed. "You will alsobe released if you give us money," their captors taunted them. In theend, though, their captors got nothing.
Twelve days after Jaspal disappeared, the thunder of helicopters filledthe air as teams of Pakistani commandos swarmed the camp. Thegovernment has declined all comment on the raid, which was apparentlyamong a series of attacks on insurgent camps. The Pakistani soldierswere surprised to find the kidnapped men who - with their hair nowshorn - had a difficult time convincing their rescuers that they wereSikhs and not militants.
Amid the gunfire during the raid, Surjeet had been shot twice in theabdomen but is recovering well. Gurvinder has moved in with familyliving in the far off city of Lahore. Both say that some day they hopeto return home. They were both saddened to discover, upon their arrivalin Peshawar, that the militants had killed Jaspal to pressure theirfamilies to pay a ransom. The 29-year-old, who leaves behind a wife andfour young children, had been decapitated.
"Our captors told us they would release him but they were lying to us.Miscreants never tell you the truth. We were thinking that perhaps theyhad released him, or were keeping him somewhere else. The thought thatthey had killed Jaspal never entered our minds," said Surjeet.