Plane hijacker walks free after 37 years

Abdul Manan Ghbizei, who once tried to seize control of a PIA flight from Karachi to Quetta in 1988, has stepped out of prison after nearly 37 years of incarceration.

His freedom came after the Karachi-based Saturday Welfare Group (SWG) paid off a fine of about Rs1 million. The organisation regularly assists prisoners across the country who are unable to pay their penalties and also provides medicines, clean water, and sanitation facilities in jails.

Prison sources recall that Manan's initial years behind bars were turbulent — he often quarreled with other inmates and attempted to stir dissent against authorities, which led to his transfer to Khuzdar jail.

With time, however, his outlook softened, and he began admitting to fellow prisoners and officials alike that he had committed a grave mistake. One senior jail officer remembered him saying repeatedly that he regretted his actions deeply.

A native of the Ghbizei clan in Balochistan's Qilla Abdullah district, Manan was a young man at the time of the failed hijacking. Security personnel subdued him swiftly, and he was handed over to the police.

The true reasons behind his attempt were never established, though it took place under the rule of General Ziaul Haq, during a period when the Afghan war was at its height and Pakistan was caught between the rivalries of global superpowers. Manan's life has been shaped by prison walls — his youth, adulthood, and the early years of old age spent behind bars.

With his release, uncertainty hangs over what path he will now take: whether to live quietly as a reformed man or to finally speak out about the circumstances that drove him to hijacking.