TN priest back after 8 months in Taliban custody

New Delhi: Jesuit priest Fr. Alexis Premkumar Antonysamy from Tamil Nadu, who was released from captivity eight months after he was abducted by the Taliban at Herat in Afghanistan last June, reached Delhi on Sunday. Officials said details of the efforts that led to his release could not be shared. “God has saved me, I thank him first. It is because of Prime Minister Narendra Modi that I am back in India,” Fr. Premkumar said, emerging out of the Delhi airport. The external affairs ministry said Fr. Premkumar’s release was secured after it was “pursued by our leadership, including at the highest levels [by] the Prime Minister.” Fr. Premkumar was visiting a Jesuit Refugee Service-support educational institution near Herat when he was kidnapped on June 2.