By Mohd. Ismail Khan, TwoCircles.net
Hyderabad: For the Muslims in India especially in the south the people who belong to the sectarian organization called Deendar Anjuman are not at all the followers of Islam, they are widely believed to be an offshoot of Qadiyani community, thus damned by the whole Muslim community. But for the governmental security agencies they are the hard core Islamist who are assigned by ISI to convert India into an Islamic state, thus haunted by the government.
There were 12 bomb blasts in different churches in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Goa and Maharashtra during the period between 21 May and 9 July, 2000. Only Three persons got minor injuries in a blast at the American Baptist Church in Ongole in Andhra Pradesh, no body else was injured in the other blasts. The speculations were towards VHP in the beginning but soon the wind changed direction. There was a mysterious blast in a car in the Vijaywada high way in which three people died and one got serious injuries. All of them belonged to Deendar Anjuman, police alleged that people died in that car blast were the bomb-makers who were behind all those blasts in churches and Deendar came into the radar. With that mysterious car bomb blast the security agencies got big ‘break through’ in the church blast cases. The lone survivor of that car blast S.M. Ibrahim allegedly gave a confessional statement in the police custody of unleashing terror strikes in the churches. Basing on his confessional statement 52 persons belonging to Deendar Anjuman was arrested by the police from A.P, Karnataka and Maharashtra. Deendar Anjuman and all its activities were subsequently banned in 2001 under Section 3 of the Un-Lawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967.
Strangely, in the past seven decades little has come to light about the activities of this sect, which preaches that Islam is a mixture of local cultures, religions and traditions. All these years, neither any central intelligence agency nor the state police bothered to investigate the Anjuman’s activities. But just two month investigation in 12 minor church blasts and the subsequent allegedly related blast in a car made Deendar Anjuman an obscure Islamic sect that is remote-controlled from Pakistan. Even the then Union Home Minister L K Advani announced in Parliament on August 3 that union government will ban this sectarian organization because as there is concrete proof of organization relations with ISI. And prime minister of the time Atal Bihari Vajpayee met Pope John Paul II and assured him thorough action against the perpetrators of violence against Christians.
Fifty-two individuals faced trail in A.P TADA court under Section 436 (mischief by fire or explosive substance), Section 120B (criminal conspiracy), Section 121 (waging war against the nation), Section 121A (conspiracy to wage war), Section 124A (sedition), Section 153A (provocation to cause riot), and Section 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), along with the provisions of the Explosive Substances Act. After 4 year and 3 months in prison 31 was convicted for 4 year term and 21 were acquitted, those 31were also let off as they have already spent 4 years in jail.
But the trouble didn’t end here for 23 of those convicted Muslims. They were taken to Karnataka as the cases were pending against them there. They were charged again under the same sections for the same kind of offence, they spend 4 more years in jail in Karnataka. On Nov 29, 2008 the Special court in Karnataka delivered a shocking judgment. In the blast case where only 3 persons received minor injuries 11 persons were given death sentence for 2 counts and 12 got life sentence for 10 counts. They got this punishment for the same offences for which in A.P they got 4 years term. It was welcomed by mainstream media as a tough call against terrorism and Muslim media hardly reported it as the bias against that particular sect. Shocked and aggrieved by the judgment the families of the victims mainly from poor economical background appealed in the High Court. High Court has accepted their appeal and since 3 years that case is going on. It has been 11 years of trying to prove their innonce for these 23 youths who were arrested just on the basis of a police confessional statement.
TwoCircles.net spoke to some of the families of convicted persons who are in jail. Sajida Sidiqua is the sister of Sheikh Hassham Ali who is now on the death row. He was 26 year old videographer when was arrested by the A.P Police. Sajida recalls his arrest for us, she said, “My brother was in Mumbai when police came looking for him in our house. We told the police about his whereabouts police told my father that they just want to talk to him regarding church bomb blast case. My brother after knowing about this immediately returned back to Hyderabad and went to the Asif Nagar Police Station. But police arrested him immediately and in F.I.R they registered it was mentioned that police nabbed my brother from Mumbai when he was trying to flee the country.”
Brother Sheikh Irfan Ali adds, “My brother is being put in jail and punished for 11 long years for the no crime of his. He was handpicked by the police just like other youths from our locality to close the case. We got no help from any Muslim organization; wherever we went we have been shown the exit door. Even the courts which was our last hope to get justice has failed us.”
The interesting irony of this case is the youths who have been arrested in this case from A.P were all belong to Asif Nagar locality a ghetto of Deendar Anjuman in the city. And many families like of Hasham Ali’s have alleged that trial court of Karnataka given that bias judgment because the judge, the public prosecutor and the government lawyer which was representing those 23 youths belonged to the Lingayat community and it is a well known fact of serious rivalry between Lingayat and Deendar because later have converted many of formers community individuals to Islam.
Syeda Rahimunissa is the wife of Mohd Sharffuddin. Mohd Sharffuddin has four children from his marriage to Rahimunnisa. When he got arrested he was 30 year old and his youngest child was 3 month old. He is now awarded death sentence and is in jail for 11 years. Syeda Rahimunissa told TCN, “My husband was a family man he cannot even think of doing such a thing leaving his 4 children, two old parents and wife behind. He was just made a scapegoat to declare the investigation complete. He was the lone bread earner of our family. Since 11 years my children and I have faced enormous difficulties making every effort to get our ends meet.”
She further said, “Police is not having a single iota of evidence against my husband in the involvement of blasts and they have given him the death sentence. Is there any justice and rule of law in this country, at least by seeing my case no one can easily say that there is a justice system in this country.” Talking about her difficulties in bearing legal expenses for the last 11 years she said, “in the beginning we relied on our government lawyer as we did not have money to bear the legal expenses, but that government lawyer showed bias in fighting the case as he was belonged to the Lingayat community, after that bitter experience we all the victims of 23 families managed to get a private lawyer. I have to sell my house which was our lone property and all my jewelry to bear all the legal expenses and the expenses to visit my husband in jail.”
All the families of the 23 convicted persons have hired a single advocate to fight their case in the high court. Rahimunnissa was not the only one who has to sell the property to bear the legal expenses. They are many who even sold their petty business to arrange money for the appeal in the High Court. Many of the families have even said that no lawyer especially Muslims were not ready to fight their case allegedly due to prejudice against their sect by the rest of the Muslim community.
Tabassum Begum is also one of the victim of police witch-hunt and biased judiciary. She is the wife of Syed Abbas Ali who has got death sentence after spending 11 years in prison. It was just 9 months since they got married when police came down hunting for him. Abbas ali was a carpenter by profession and was just 20 at the time of his arrest.
Tabassum told TCN that her life changed forever after her husband’s arrest. She said, “Me and my husband got married at very early age. He was the sole bread earner of my family, whatever he used to earn from his carpentry work was use to be enough for family survival. But after his arrest my family is making many sacrifices. I started making Aagarbatis (Incense Sticks) at home to earn some money. We have to sell our house and other items of the house.”
She even said, “We have got no help from the Muslim community as they dislike our sect. But the most shocking thing for us is even the leaders of our sect have alienated us and sees our families as the reason behind the ban on our organization”
It was quite expected that Muslim community will disown and boycott them because of the oblivious sectarian difference. But interesting and rather surprising thing to note is even Deendar Anjuman had disown those 23 convicted youths and alienated them from their sect. a deliberate and desperate move to clear the sect name and to lobby to lift the ban from the organization.
TCN spoke to Mr. Hashmat Pasha Advocate who is representing those 23 Muslim youths in the Karnataka high court. He said to us that “Trial court of Karnataka was seriously wrong in their judgment as there is no proofs against my clients accept the testimony and police confessional statement of one survivor of the car blast that is not at all enough to award life sentence let alone death sentence.” He even raised serious legal point “my clients were already tried in A.P trail court for the same offence and got only 4 years imprisonment only for possessing allegedly inflammatory material, now they cannot be retried again for the same offences in the different trail court, it is against natural justice.”
He further said that his clients have already spend 11 years in jail and even the appeal in the High Court is consuming lot of time, “If they are going to be freed by the High Court which I am positive of but the injustice and irreparable damage will already have done to them and no judgment in the world could bring back their youth days which they spent missing their love ones.”
It is an appalling story of a shocking judgment and deep conceived prejudice against a community. Those 23 convicted was forced to waste their major portion of life behind bars. None of them have any type of criminal record before their arrests. All of them might have been divided by regions but one thing is common among them all come from poor economical background. One among them Rasheed Hermaat from Hubli died in Belgum jail due to mental depression. Police even after 11 long years have not able to got even a single evidence to relate them directly to the bomb blats. The only evidence was the confessional statement of S.M Ibrahim and a book “Imamul-jihad” written by their sect’s founder, seized from them, which allegedly teaches hatred against communities. But none of this evidence seems sufficient to award a dead penalty.
Every family we talked was asking for the support of Muslim community to speak for them as they are also a victim of war against terror. Rahimunnisa said ‘If can’t help us accepting as a fellow Muslim then just help us as a fellow human being’.