Sunday 10 February 2013

A perfect day for democracy

Arundhati Roy



Wasn’t it? Yesterday I mean. Spring announced itself in Delhi. The sun was out, and the Law took its Course. Just before breakfast, Afzal Guru, prime accused in the 2001 Parliament Attack was secretly hanged, and his body was interred in Tihar Jail. Was he buried next to Maqbool Butt? (The other Kashmiri who was hanged in Tihar in 1984. Kashmiris will mark that anniversary tomorrow.) Afzal’s wife and son were not informed. “The Authorities intimated the family through Speed Post and Registered Post,” the Home Secretary told the press, “the Director General of J&K Police has been told to check whether they got it or not.” No big deal, they’re only the family of a Kashmiri terrorist.

In a moment of rare unity the Nation, or at least its major political parties, the Congress, the BJP and the CPM came together as one (barring a few squabbles about ‘delay’ and ‘timing’) to celebrate the triumph of the Rule of Law. The Conscience of the Nation, which broadcasts live from TV studios these days, unleashed its collective intellect on us—the usual cocktail of papal passion and a delicate grip on facts. Even though the man was dead and gone, like cowards that hunt in packs, they seemed to need each other to keep their courage up. Perhaps because deep inside themselves they know that they all colluded to do something terribly wrong.

What are the facts?

On the 13th of December 2001 five armed men drove through the gates of the Parliament House in a white Ambassador fitted out with an Improvised Explosive Device. When they were challenged they jumped out of the car and opened fire. They killed eight security personnel and a gardener. In the gun battle that followed, all five attackers were killed. In one of the many versions of confessions he made in police custody, Afzal Guru identified the men as Mohammed, Rana, Raja, Hamza and Haider. That’s all we know about them even today. L.K. Advani, the then Home Minister, said they ‘looked like Pakistanis.’ (He should know what Pakistanis look like right? Being a Sindhi himself.) Based only on Afzal’s confession (which the Supreme Court subsequently set aside citing ‘lapses’ and ‘violations of procedural safeguards’) the Government of India recalled its Ambassador from Pakistan and mobilized half a million soldiers to the Pakistan border. There was talk of nuclear war. Foreign embassies issued Travel Advisories and evacuated their staff from Delhi. The standoff lasted for months and cost India thousands of crores.

On the 14th of December 2001 the Delhi Police Special Cell claimed it had cracked the case. On the 15th of December it arrested the ‘master mind’ Professor S.A.R Geelani in Delhi and Showkat Guru and Afzal Guru in a fruit market in Srinagar. Subsequently they arrested Afsan Guru, Showkat’s wife. The media enthusiastically disseminated the Special Cell’s version. These were some of the headlines: ‘DU Lecturer was Terror Plan Hub’, ‘Varsity Don Guided Fidayeen’, ‘Don Lectured on Terror in Free Time.’ Zee TV broadcast a ‘docudrama’ called December 13th , a recreation that claimed to be the ‘Truth Based on the Police Charge Sheet.’ (If the police version is the truth, then why have courts?) Then Prime Minister Vajpayee and L.K. Advani publicly appreciated the film. The Supreme Court refused to stay the screening saying that the media would not influence judges. The film was broadcast only a few days before the fast track court sentenced Afzal, Showkat and Geelani to death. Subsequently the High Court acquitted the ‘mastermind’, Professor S.A.R Geelani, and Afsan Guru. The Supreme Court upheld the acquittal. But in its 5th August 2005 judgment it gave Mohammed Afzal three life sentences and a double death sentence.

Contrary to the lies that have been put about by some senior journalists who would have known better, Afzal Guru was not one of “the terrorists who stormed Parliament House on December 13th 2001” nor was he among those who “opened fire on security personnel, apparently killing three of the six who died.” (That was the BJP Rajya Sabha MP, Chandan Mitra, in The Pioneer, October 7th 2006). Even the police charge sheet does not accuse him of that. The Supreme Court judgment says the evidence is circumstantial: “As is the case with most conspiracies, there is and could be no evidence amounting to criminal conspiracy.” But then it goes on to say: “The incident, which resulted in heavy casualties had shaken the entire nation, and the collective conscience of society will only be satisfied if capital punishment is awarded to the offender.”

Who crafted our collective conscience on the Parliament Attack case? Could it have been the facts we gleaned in the papers? The films we saw on TV?

There are those who will argue that the very fact that the courts acquitted S.A.R Geelani and convicted Afzal proves that the trial was free and fair. Was it?

The trial in the fast-track court began in May 2002. The world was still convulsed by post 9/11 frenzy. The US government was gloating prematurely over its ‘victory’ in Afghanistan. The Gujarat pogrom was ongoing. And in the Parliament Attack case, the Law was indeed taking its own course. At the most crucial stage of a criminal case, when evidence is presented, when witnesses are cross-examined, when the foundations of the argument are laid—in the High Court and Supreme Court you can only argue points of law, you cannot introduce new evidence— Afzal Guru, locked in a high security solitary cell, had no lawyer. The court-appointed junior lawyer did not visit his client even once in jail, he did not summon any witnesses in Afzal’s defense and did not cross examine the prosecution witnesses. The judge expressed his inability to do anything about the situation.

Even still, from the word go, the case fell apart. A few examples out of many:
How did the police get to Afzal? They said that S.A.R Geelani led them to him. But the court records show that the message to arrest Afzal went out before they picked up Geelani. The High Court called this a ‘material contradiction’ but left it at that.

The two most incriminating pieces of evidence against Afzal were a cellphone and a laptop confiscated at the time of arrest. The Arrest Memos were signed by Bismillah, Geelani’s brother, in Delhi. The Seizure Memos were signed by two men of the J&K Police, one of them an old tormentor from Afzal’s past as a surrendered ‘militant’. The computer and cellphone were not sealed, as evidence is required to be. During the trial it emerged that the hard disc of the laptop had been accessed after the arrest. It only contained the fake home ministry passes and the fake identity cards that the terrorists used to access Parliament. And a Zee TV video clip of Parliament House. So according to the police, Afzal had deleted all the information except the most incriminating bits, and he was speeding off to hand it over to Ghazi Baba, who the charge sheet described as the Chief of Operations.

A witness for the prosecution, Kamal Kishore, identified Afzal and told the court he had sold him the crucial SIM card that connected all the accused in the case to each other on the 4th of December 2001. But the prosecution’s own call records showed that the SIM was actually operational from November 6th 2001.

It goes on and on, this pile up of lies and fabricated evidence. The courts note them, but for their pains the police get no more than a gentle rap on their knuckles. Nothing more.
Then there’s the back story. Like most surrendered militants Afzal was easy meat in Kashmir—a victim of torture, blackmail, extortion. Anybody who was really interested in solving the mystery of the Parliament Attack would have followed the dense trail of evidence that leads into the shadowy grid in Kashmir that connects militants to surrendered militants, renegades to Special Police Officers, the Special Operations Group to the Special Task Force, and upwards and onwards. And upwards and onwards.

But now that Afzal Guru has been hanged, I hope our collective conscience has been satisfied. Or is our cup of blood still only half full?

14 comments:

  1. Dammit Afzal was innocent! Or at least, it was way more complicated - and horrible - from the Indian deep-state side)

    Another story - the tourist / [tourists?] who were killed by 'Al-Faran' - I was then at the Indian Statistical Institute Calcutta - I had insisted - on campus and off campus and on the internet --- the Indian State was involved - I was mostly laughed off as a conspiracy-theorist. Recently there's been a book out - at least The Asian Age Calcutta gave the author/authors fair amount of space - twice - which alleges the same.

    I'm going to throw up.

    Afzal Guru, RIP.

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    Replies
    1. Such utter disgust comes from the mouths of people who judge others before themselves . Only one has that power and the language used in the comments before me was so offensive . I had never heard such language . Oh Well , free speech , but you such a brilliant author using words with such passion and beauty from your uniquely creative style choose to use words with purpose and determination to motivativate and encourage others with so little hope or self - esteem . I just wanted to say that I appreciate your compassion and thoughtfulness . I only hope to use words in such a purposeful way one day because all of my life I have learned from reading words of all influences and areas of curiosities to share the light with others . Thank you sincerely for sharing your light ,

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  3. Who knows, Afzal perhaps did not deserve the death penalty, but he was not innocent. Do you know that thousands of other innocent Indians are languishing in our jails and thousands other criminals are let lose. Indian justice is far from perfect, but India cannot afford individual justice at the cost of national security and self-image which has been slapped left, right and center by people like you. Start conversing in Hindi or Bengali, stop trying to imitate western pseudo-seculars, get original. You are no thinker. India cannot afford people like you who get a stage because of nothing but a western approval, not yet.

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  4. Dear Mam,

    Request you to kindly watch this- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zJcFO8VvqA... Maybe there were short comings in the judicial process but there is no denying the fact that he was involved in this heinous attack... With all due respect you are a great writer but your perpetual pursuit of conspiracies is at times baffling particularly in favor of the failed left cause..

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  5. Arundhati Roy,

    If you are not fully sure about the background story just dont comment like this, sometimes your words may turn out to be misleading to others who just reads the heading of news papers. Terrorism at any level is not acceptable .

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  6. America ne laden ko pakada or use maar kar use pani me baha diya ? A
    pp is bare me kya kahti he .
    me ise desh prem kahta hu.

    ReplyDelete
  7. @ SANA,Lalit Khanna and others.
    can you please tell me who was Baghat Singh? And if Afzal Guru was a terrorist then Who was Baghat Singh??

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    1. Asif Marzai

      Shaheed Bhagat Singh Was a influential revolutionaries of the Indian independence movement.Ok.And Afzal guru was a terrorist who was misleaded by Pakistanis terrorists group. For your Kind information let me tell you that King of kashmir himself accepted that he will be with India.

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  8. Asif Marzai

    Shaheed Bhagat Singh Was a influential revolutionaries of the Indian independence movement.Ok.And Afzal guru was a terrorist who was misleaded by Pakistanis terrorists group. For your Kind information let me tell you that King of kashmir himself accepted that he will be with India.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Hi! Here's something you might be interested in reading, an article in praise of "The God Of Small Things"

    http://awestruckwanderer.wordpress.com/2014/05/14/in-praise-of-arundhati-roys-the-god-of-small-things-by-eduardo-carli-de-moraes/

    ReplyDelete
  10. can someone pls tell me how to contact her directly? her mail id or phone number or anything? pls

    ReplyDelete
  11. can someone pls tell me how to contact her directly? her mail id or phone number or anything? pls

    ReplyDelete
  12. Would you like to read some motivational posts and other book reviews on my blog:
    http://readingkeeda.blogspot.com

    I would love to have your feedback.

    ReplyDelete