Kashmir Singh with wife Paramjit Kaur at Attari on Tuesday. (PTI)

Chandigarh, March 4: The laddoo from wife Paramjit gave Kashmir Singh his taste of freedom at Attari.

“You are as shy as you were when I had left saying I would be back soon,” the 67-year-old said, hands trembling and eyes moist, after he crossed the border checkpost from Wagah in Pakistan this afternoon. Son Sheeshpal, daughters-in-law Manjeet and Sukhwinder, and childhood friend G.C. Bhardwaj struggled to hold back tears.

For Kashmir and Paramjit, 60, today’s reunion at the BSF office symbolised a love story that had survived 35 years of separation. “I thank my wife for doing so much for my release. She also took care of my children,” he said.

Paramjit, who had to work as a domestic help and do other odd jobs after her husband was arrested in 1973 in Rawalpindi and jailed on spying charges, appeared to have put the painful past behind her. “We don’t have much time to cry over what has happened. We must enjoy whatever time we have left with us. Let us go home together. There are people waiting for you,” she said.

After a briefing from intelligence agencies, a procedure followed for all such prisoners from Pakistan, Kashmir reached Nangal Choran, his village in Hoshiarpur, around 4.30pm to a tumultuous reception.

In their moment of happiness, the family didn’t forget to thank Ansar Burney, the Pakistan human rights minister who had worked for the release and persuaded President Pervez Musharraf to pardon Kashmir Singh, who had been handed the death penalty in the 70s.

“I am grateful to President Musharraf, Burney saab, the people of Pakistan and all those who looked after me in jail for giving me a second life,” Kashmir Singh said. Like his new life, his prison uniform had given way to new clothes.

Earlier in the day, Kashmir Singh gave Burney a long hug. “I was finding it difficult to control my tears when I was hugging Singh. I want that all Indians also hug Pakistanis with the same emotion,” the minister said, adding that he would take up the case of Sarabjit Singh, another Indian on death row in Pakistan.

After his release on Monday, Singh spent the night in a luxury hotel before being driven today by Pakistani officials to the border. The only signs of his days in jail were his meagre belongings, stuffed in a small plastic bag.

Kashmir would have been executed in 1978, after his mercy petition was rejected by then President Fazal Ilahi Chaudhry. Later, he was lost in the maze of Pakistani jails, waiting to be led away to the gallows any day.

Today, though, there was little sign of bitterness. “They (the Pakistani authorities) treated me well. I wasn’t beaten.”

Kashmir Singh said he hadn’t gone to Pakistan to smuggle goods or to spy for India. “I was not involved in anything. Nothing was found on me.”

Singh admitted it was a mistake to have gone without a passport. He said would go to Pakistan again, this time with a “passport and work for the good of both nations”.