By IANS,
Dubai : A United Arab Emirates (UAE) national, who saved two men, including an Indian, from death row, said his act was in response to the friendship he struck with the duo while he was in jail.
“They taught me the Quran and religious matters in which I was very weak,” 42-year-old UAE national Khadim M. Al Daheri told the Gulf News after having helped secure the pardon from the family of the victim, from Kerala in India, who was murdered.
Radwad Naeem Al Deen, 37, from Maharashtra in India, and Abdul Rahim Mohammad Farouq, 43, from Sri Lanka, have reached their homes 10 years after being sentenced to death for having murdered their roommate over the issue of which movie to watch on television.
“I am planning to take the two men for Umrah (pilgrimage to Makkah) next month. I have never met such good people,” the newspaper quoted Daheri as saying.
Daheri said he met the two men when he was sent to a jail in Al Ain – UAE’s fourth largest city in the emirate of Abu Dhabi – in 2001 for an economic offence.
“I was held accountable for certain financial irregularities committed by a group of Arab nationals who ran an agricultural company under my sponsorship and fled the country,” he said.
He was freed in 2005 and, at the time of his release, he promised Al Deen and Farouq that he would help secure their release.
“I knew it was not easy as their families had already travelled to Kerala several times to secure the pardon from the victim’s family, but with little success,” he was quoted as saying.
However, his efforts got a boost when he met a Kerala-based businessman who frequently visited UAE.
“He played a crucial role in convincing the family of the victim to grant the pardon,” said Al Daheri.
Thereafter, Saeed Mohammad Al Ameri, a prominent citizen of Al Ain, donated 300,000 dirhams ($81,683) as ‘diya’ or blood money for the victim’s family.
Al Deen and Farouq were released from death row in March this year.
“I don’t want any credit because it was not only myself, but a lot of good people that made it possible,” the Kerala businessman, who refused to be identified, told the newspaper.
The businessman used the help of some prominent people he knew to secure the pardon from the victim’s family in Kozhikode, Kerala.
“My family and I tried to speak to the victim’s family but with little success. My brothers also visited them several times,” Norjahan, Al Deen’s mother, told the Gulf News from Maharashtra after her son reached home.
On his part, Al Deen said he had no words to express his happiness after meeting his parents, wife and three children.
“I did not have any money but Daheri gave me flight tickets and some money. He regularly calls me,” Al Deen was quoted as saying.