Framed As a Terrorist by Mohammad Aamir Khan & Nandita Haksar

Author:Mohammad Aamir Khan & Nandita Haksar [Khan, Mohammad Aamir & Haksar, Nandita]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Speaking Tiger Publishing Pvt Ltd
Published: 2016-01-14T00:00:00+00:00

5

PROVING MY INNOCENCE

~

‘I could not sleep that night. The faces of the victims of the blasts kept floating by and I decided that when I was released I would seek them out and tell them the truth about how the police had kidnapped me and tortured me.’

he next morning I tried eating the jail meals but I could not make myself swallow the food. But by dinner time I was so hungry I ate the vegetables even though I saw worms in the dish. I found out that there was a canteen within the jail where we could buy basic necessities such as soap, toothpaste and hair oil. There was also another canteen which sold tea and snacks such as samosas and jalebis. But I did not have money. I desperately needed a new set of clothes. The only clothes I had were the ones I was wearing on the day the police kidnapped me when I was on my way to buy medicine.

I knew Abbu and Ammi would eventually find their way to the jail so I waited anxiously when the nambardars came to call out the names for the mulaqaats, or meetings. A nambardar was a convict who had the privilege of assisting the jail authorities. He would come to each ward and call out: ‘Han bhai mulaqaat sun lo.’ We would all gather around him and wait for the lucky ones who had visitors. It was one of the two ways we got news of the outside world; the second was when we were taken to the court.

It was in the first week of May that I heard my name called out. I could not believe it so I asked whether he had really called out my name. I was so happy. I had not met Abbu or Ammi since my arrest, except for the brief encounter during the time I was in remand; at the court I had got just a glimpse of them. We had hardly spoken to each other.

It took almost an hour to finish the formalities before I could reach the mulaqaat room. I had to register my name at the chakkar and then at the deodhi. The mulaqaat room was very noisy. There were so many prisoners crushed together in the hall and we could not see clearly through the wire mesh and grilles. I went close to the grilles and spotted Ammi and Abbu through the wire mesh. On seeing them I burst into tears. My mother saw me and she too could not stop her tears. Abbu stood stoically looking at me. Ammi wanted to know how I was, whether I had good food.

Abbu told me to control myself and then asked in a voice full of pain—pain born of shame: ‘Kya hua, kaise hua?’ This was the first time I could actually speak to them. There was a huge crowd so we had to talk very loudly. People were listening to us, both visitors and the prisoners. But I told them what had happened.

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