Britain cannot interfere in the Indian legal process, the Foreign Office has said on the eve of a Supreme Court hearing for six ex-soldiers accused of illegal weapons charges almost two years ago.
The British men have been refused permission to leave India after they were arrested in October 2013 while working as anti-piracy security guards for a private US-owned ship.
There was hope for the men when the charges were dropped last year, but the Indian authorities kept their passports and an appeal by prosecutors will be heard, starting on Tuesday at the Supreme Court.
A Foreign Office spokesman said: "We are in close contact with all six men and continue to provide assistance to them and their families.
"We have raised this case with Indian authorities at all levels, urging for it to be resolved as soon as possible, and will continue to do so.
"However we cannot interfere in an ongoing legal process in another country."
The detained men are Nick Dunn, from Ashington, Northumberland, Ray Tindall from Chester, Paul Towers, from Yorkshire, John Armstrong, from Wigton, Cumbria, Billy Irving, from Connel, Scotland, and Nicholas Simpson, from Catterick, North Yorkshire.
They were working for US maritime company AdvanFort providing anti-piracy protection when their ship - MV Seaman Guard Ohio, which had a crew of 35 - was detained.
The plight of the men was raised in a Westminster Hall debate by MPs earlier this year, when Ian Lavery, Labour MP for Wansbeck, claimed the group which included men who had served in the Army in Iraq and Afghanistan felt "utterly betrayed" and abandoned by the Government as so little progress had been made.
Their families have been helping them as the men are not allowed to work, and some have had to sell their cars and even homes to support their loved ones.
Foreign Office minister Hugo Swire replied at the time that the Prime Minister, Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, former foreign secretary William Hague and other British officials have repeatedly raised the case with Indian authorities at local, state and national level.
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