{"id":397758,"date":"2019-03-01T21:30:09","date_gmt":"2019-03-01T20:30:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/prison-planet-com-pakistan-brings-indian-pilot-captured-from-downed-plane-to-border-crossing-for-handover\/"},"modified":"2019-03-01T21:30:09","modified_gmt":"2019-03-01T20:30:09","slug":"prison-planet-com-pakistan-brings-indian-pilot-captured-from-downed-plane-to-border-crossing-for-handover","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/prison-planet-com-pakistan-brings-indian-pilot-captured-from-downed-plane-to-border-crossing-for-handover\/","title":{"rendered":"Prison Planet.com \u00bb Pakistan brings Indian pilot captured from downed plane to border crossing for handover"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>      <!-- START CONTENT --><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rt.com\/news\/452749-pakistan-indian-pilot-handover\/\"><strong>RT<\/strong><\/a><br \/>March 1, 2019<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pakistan has brought the Indian Air Force pilot shot down and captured in an aerial skirmish on Wednesday to a border crossing with India to hand him over. Prime Minister Imran Khan earlier announced it as a peace gesture.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, cheering crowds have gathered on the Indian side of the border near Attari-Wagah, awaiting the return of the captured pilot. Residents waving India\u2019s national flag and holding a huge garland of flowers lined the road.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Visuals from Attari-Wagah border; Wing Commander <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/AbhinandanVarthaman?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#AbhinandanVarthaman<\/a> to be received by a team of Indian Air Force. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/C4wv14AEAd\">pic.twitter.com\/C4wv14AEAd<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 ANI (@ANI) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ANI\/status\/1101438557372076033?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">March 1, 2019<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Earlier in the day, the father of Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman, himself a decorated Air Force pilot, as well as\u00a0his mother, were given a standing ovation on a flight that brought the pair to the India-Pakistan border. Passengers made way for them, ensuring that the couple gets off first.<\/p>\n<p>Varthaman\u2019s jet was hit this Wednesday during a dogfight involving Indian MiG-21s and Pakistani F-16s. He ejected from the plane but landed in the Pakistani-administered part of Kashmir where he was captured by locals.<\/p>\n<p>Shortly after the downing, viral videos that emerged on social media showing the pilot surrounded and beaten up by an angry mob, with Pakistani soldiers trying to rescue him. In addition to that, Pakistan released \u2013 and then deleted \u2013 footage showing the pilot blindfolded and with blood on his face.<\/p>\n<p>In later video, the Wing Commander is seen sipping tea during a brief interrogation by Pakistani military. He lists his name, military rank and says he was from \u201cdown south\u201d of India, but refused to share any details of his mission or the aircraft he has flown.<\/p>\n<p>According to NDTV, 8 Indian Air Force fighter jets intercepted 24 Pakistani warplanes during the engagement. The Indian Air Force has claimed that one of its MiG-21 Bison aircraft shot&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.prisonplanet.com\/pakistan-brings-indian-pilot-captured-from-downed-plane-to-border-crossing-for-handover.html\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>RTMarch 1, 2019 Pakistan has brought the Indian Air Force pilot shot down and captured in an aerial skirmish on Wednesday to a border crossing with India to hand him over. Prime Minister Imran Khan earlier announced it as a peace gesture. Meanwhile, cheering crowds have gathered on the Indian side of the border near [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-397758","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=397758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397758\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=397758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=397758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=397758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}