A sub-postmaster wrongly accused of stealing money from the Post Office has told how he was sectioned three times as the ordeal took its toll on his mental health.

Balvinder Gill, 45, started running the post office in Cowley Road in 2003.

He was bankrupted trying to repay £108,000 the Post Office said he stole.

His mother Kashmir, who worked at the same branch, was found guilty of stealing £57,000 in 2009.

Her conviction was overturned by the Court of Appeal in 2021.

READ MORE: Dangerous driver hits 115mph in M40 police chase

Rishi Sunak said on Wednesday that a new law would be introduced clearing the names of hundreds of people wrongly convicted because of faulty Horizon IT software.

It came after ITV drama Mr Bates v The Post Office caused a public outcry.

Mr Gill called his family’s experience an “indirect, oppressive kind of racism”.

He said: “My parents were spoken to as if they were idiots because they’re not white. They were made to feel like they didn’t understand the system and that they were stupid.”

He told BBC Newsnight he knew "from the very start" there was something wrong with the Horizon system.

"I had a background in maths and computer science so I thought I was quite savvy with IT," he said.

Mr Gill, who was newly married at the time, said he paid the shortfalls back by "robbing Peter to feed Paul" using money from the retail side of his business to compensate the shortfall.

"Three times I have been sectioned for mental health," he said.

"Most of the decade after it happened I was hounded literally every month for money from them against this debt.

"They had civil proceedings to try and secure the debt against me.

Oxford Mail: Cowley Road post office

"In the first decade, we were so poor. I was giving them 30 per cent of what I earned, you were never means tested.

"I remember having to take [short-term] Wonga loans, not having petrol to go to work."

Mr Gill told the BBC he was "happy to hear" that action would be taken.

He said he had received very "nominal" compensation because he became bankrupt, which means the money owed remains part of his original estate.

In 2019, Mrs Gill told the Oxford Mail of the 'nightmare' experience that destroyed her life.

She said: “My family was broken. We are never going to recover from this.

“I told them they could take my house or anything they wanted.

”I was devastated as they also said we were the only case.”

In the end, Mrs Gill and her husband Gurnan and family felt helpless against the accusations and decided to pay the £57,000 to the company - money she and her husband had been saving for their retirement.

They hoped that the Post Office would not proceed with any charges.

READ MORE: Crash closes country lane 

Mrs Gill said her fear of her reputation being destroyed was more important than anything else at that moment as her job had meant everything to her.

As a first-generation immigrant from a small village in India, she said: “I wasn’t educated, and I was really happy because this was a job that I could handle.

“My family was so proud of my job and achievements.”

Struggling to find a new job because of her criminal record, she spent the five years after her wrongful conviction pot washing in the back of an Indian takeaway.

She said: “I cried in court every time. I didn’t want to live any more.”