By Mohammed Siddique, TwoCircles.net,
Hyderabad: In Moosarambagh area of old Hyderabad, a family living in the shadows of police terror and media pressure for the last five years, is now seeing a glimmer of hope and a reason to be hopeful.
Abdul Wahed, 62 year old retired teacher and father of nine children, is now looking forward to see his youngest son Abdul Majeed after several months as the Andhra Pradesh High Court has granted him the bail. Majeed, a cell phone repairer is expected to come out of Charlapally jail in Hyderabad in a day or two after completion of legal formalities.
Abdul Majeed is the younger brother of Abdul Shahed alias Bilal, who according to the police is one of the most wanted terrorist in the country and involved in several terrorist attacks. The police say Abdul Shahed, missing for last five years, is a key operative of Laskhar-e-Tayyaba as well as Bangladesh based Harkautl Jihad-e-Islami.
The family of Abdul Wahed has paid a very heavy price for his relations with Shahed. First it was his second brother Abdul Zahed who was arrested by the Hyderabad city police in 2005 in connection with the suicide bombing of police Task Forces headquarters. Police charged that Zahed, working at the behest of Shahed had helped a Bangladeshi terrorist who blew himself in the task force office killing a constable.
Even as Zahed was languishing in a jail in Visakhapatnam, about 750 kms away from Hyderabad and his family, another son of Abdul Wahed, Abdul Majeed was picked up by the police in September last year from outside his home. His arrest was declared only a week later as police announced that he was wanted in connection with a case of anti national activities.
Majeed was among 26 youth arrested by the police in the aftermath of the blasts in Mecca Masjid on May 18 and in Lumbini Park and Gokul Chat eatery on August 25. But none of them were booked in connection with the blast. In stead cases of criminal conspiracy, possessing incrimination material (read CDs of Babri Masjid demolition), and waging war against the state. So far more than a dozen of these youth have come out on bail.
After a prolonged legal battle first in the city court and then High Court, the family has succeeded in obtaining the bail for Abdul Majeed. He is coming out at a time when his brother Zahed has been brought back to Hyderabad from Visakhapatna, to stand trial for the Task Force office bombing. He is one of the seven accused in the case.
“The granting of bail to Majeed vindicates my stand that my son is no terrorist and he is not involved in any anti national activities. He has been wrongly labeled as a terrorist by the police and the media. Our prayers for justice have been replied”, said Abdul Wahed, whose health as suffered badly due to the mental agony and torture of all these years.
But case of Shahed remains mysterious. Abdul Wahed, who was summoned to the various police and intelligence offices for questioning about Shahed’s whereabouts, says that ever since he went missing in 2003, there was no contact between him and the family.
“What we know about him is only from the police and the media. Some time they say he is in Pakistan, some time they say he is in Bangladesh or India. Now they are also saying he is dead. Believe me we don’t have any idea where he is and what he is doing. My several appeals through the media to Shahed to come back have gone un-responded”, he said.
The family is befuddled by the reports in media, along with photographs that Shahed along with another person was shot dead by unknown people in Karachi on August 30 last year, days after the twin blasts in Hyderabad. The reports have been never been officially confirmed by the police and intelligence in India.
In police records Shahed’s name was linked with one Ghulam Yazadani who was reportedly in charge of recruiting Indian youth in HUJI. Yazdani was killed by the police in an “encounter” outside Delhi in March 2006, a day after the blast in Varanasi temple. His family had alleged that his killing was staged.
According to the police record in Hyderabad Shahed was first involved in a conspiracy to kill the then state BJP President Indrasena Reddy and he went missing after a case was booked against him. Later his name figured in the task force blast case and last year’s blasts.
Abdul Wahed says Shahed had become the victim of circumstances and police harassment and now his other sons were paying price for being brothers of Shahed. Even after coming out of bail, Majeed will have to face the trial on the charges of anti national activities, Zahed still remains in jail and will have to wait for many more months before the court decides his case.
While brothers underwent torture and incarceration, Shahed’s elder sister paid the price with her life. She died of heart attack last year after Majeed’s arrest.
Interestingly local media, which went to town every time a Muslim youth was arrested on the suspicion of being a terrorist, has chosen not to report the granting of bail to Abdul Majeed.