Kathmandu: Damber Singh Pulami, one of the Bhutanese political prisoners, serving 43 years of jail in Chemgang Central Prison in Thimphu, after being seriously ill and has been admitted to the Intensive Care Unit at the Jigme Dorji Wangchuk National Referral Hospital in Thimphu on May 17.
According to Global Campaign for the release of Political Prisoners in Bhutan, senior Royal Bhutan Police officers are forcing Pulami’s distant relatives currently living in Bhutan to bear the responsibility and take him to their home.
“In its 2004 annual report on Human Rights in Bhutan, US State Department noted that a Bhutanese political activist, Damber Singh Pulami, a registered Bhutanese Refugee of UNHCR, aided Timai Camp in eastern Nepal, was arrested by the security forces in Bhutan on May 2001. The report further mentioned that Pulami entered Bhutan to check on the internal resettlement of non-Nepali speaking people in the South. Still, he was falsely charged with extortion, kidnapping, murder and subversive activities,” said GCRPPB.
“As per family sources, Mr Pulami has been detained in Chemgang Central Prison in Thimphu, since his arrest. He was inflicted to inhuman physical and mental torture and became seriously sick on several occasions but has survived on all such occasions.”
“Pulami’s father, Amber Bahadur Pulami, died 25 years ago in refugee camp. His mother, Ram Maya Pulami, died in 2020 in the US. They had expressed their last wishes to see their son’s face before death. Their last wishes remained unfulfilled for all time to come, said Pulami with tears in her eyes.”
The GCRPPB has appealed the Royal Government of Bhutan to provide the best available medical treatment and ensure he is fully recovered. “Once he is fully recovered, arrange to reunite with his wife and children in their resettled country. GCRPPB is happy to advocate at the US political office seeking approval of the reunion of the Pulami family on humanitarian ground,” the GCRPPB appealed.
GCRPPB also reiterate its appeals to His Majesty King of Bhutan, to have mercy and grant Amnesty to all the Bhutanese political prisoners serving sentences at Chemgang Central Jail and other prisons around the country. Until these political prisoners are freed, the Bhutanese democracy will always be questioned of its legitimacy, it said.
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