By Kashif-ul-Huda, TwoCircles.net
Advocate Shafeeq Rehman Mahajir comes from a family of lawyers. He started his professional life working in a bank in Bombay but changed directions to study law in Osmania University followed by a Masters in Law from University of London.
He started practicing law in 1984 working as a lawyer for real estate and investment projects. Not completely satisfied, he says, he asked Allah to be utilized for a higher cause in his prayers. His prayers were answered when he was appointed a lawyer for Andhra Pradesh State Minorities Commission.
Shafeeq Mahajir was asked by Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi to appear before Justice Bhaskara Rao Commission inquiring into the police firing on unarmed Muslims in the wake of Mecca Masjid blast of 2007. Shafeeq Mahajir with painstaking research work was able to demonstrate the AP Police deliberately fired on civilians. Police claimed that they fired to stop the violent crowd from burning nearby petrol pump. Mahajir proved the police claim false and showed that police fired unprovoked and fired to kill.
Advocate Mahajir talked to TwoCircles.net about Mecca Masjid blast, subsequent police firing and the long process of law when he was in Cambridge, Massachusetts to participate in MIT workshop on communal violence in India.