Ian Stillman began the Nambikkai Foundation for the Deaf in India, which was a Tearfund partner for many years. The BBC documentary about him and his work was in fact a co-production with Tearfund, and made available as a Tearfund video.

He has lived in India for nearly 30 years, and was arrested after cannabis was found in a taxi he had hired. He has now been sentenced to 10 years in an Indian jail for drugs offences. His lawyers say he has been the victim of a gross miscarriage of justice. He is suffering from the conditions in jail and his health is deteriorating.

Please feel able to write - and please pray too for Ian, his wife Sue and family, as they face this nightmare. "It is the most horrific case I`ve ever seen of an innocent man being done down by law," Stephen Jakobi of Fair Trials Abroad told the BBC.

He was refused a sign language interpreter for his trial which was conducted in Hindi; Ian had to make do with lip-reading snatches of English translation from his lawyer, she said. He wanted to give a statement in his defence but was limited to answering written questions, she said.

Ian comes from Reading in Berkshire. He was arrested last August following a visit to Manali, a town in the Himalayan foothills in the state of Himachal Pradesh, where drug smuggling is common.

Police who stopped him at a roadblock say they found a bag in his taxi containing 20kg of cannabis resin; Ian says he had never seen the bag before. He is appealing the verdict. The Foreign Office said it has helped get him a transfer to a jail with better conditions, and had asked for him to be given a bed.

"We are pressing the Indians to get the appeal process started as quickly as possible. We want them to get cracking," a spokeswoman added.

Stillman is known throughout the world for his pioneering work for deaf people. He is not only deaf: a few years ago he lost one leg below the knee in a road accident. He has an Indian wife, Yesumani.

Please pray that justice will be done; pray for Ian, his immediate family, and his relatives here in the UK.

Please write to your MP and to the Indian High Commission, as soon as possible, emphasising your concern about the nature of the trial and the conditions under which he is being held.

His Excellency Shri Nareshwar Dayal
High Commission of India
India House
Aldwych
London
WC2B 4NA

Further information can be found on the Fair Trials Abroad web site