By RINA,
Azamgarh : “My brother is innocent. A person who was scared to see even a small injury to other persons how can he be a terrorist?” This is the question posed by the sister of Arif. Arif is a native of Sanjarpur village but nowadays is in the custody of Lucknow police for his alleged involvement in the bomb blast in Lucknow Court in 2007.
In the eyes of Police Arif is a hardcore terrorist. He had been identified by his number in the mobile phone of Saif. When the family members of Arif asked the police about his crime the police replied that Arif is also a hardcore extremist like Saif.
Arif is not alone. There are seventeen more Arifs in Azamgarh who have been detained and then labeled by the police as hardcore extremists since 2007. If you look into the eyes of the youths in and around Arif’s native village you would find a strange fear and terror in them. There are several households in this village in which children are scared to venture out especially at night.
According to Mohammad Rashid, a twenty seven year old local resident, “This is a very dangerous trend. Politicians have nothing concrete to save their skin which is why they are involving in this sort of activities to frame the Muslim youth. The divisive forces are at work”. Yet another Waseem Ahmad opined: “Youths and especially the Muslim Youths from Azamgarh are being targeted in the name of terrorism.”
Human Rights activist Mohammad Tariq stated: “Recently Shivpal Yadav of Samajwadi Party visited here he promised to take up the issues of Muslims. But if he is really serious then he must raise the issue in the Parliament. Why did Akbar Ahmad Dumpy, the Bahujan Samaj Party candidate from here,not raise the question in the Parliament?”
Extremism is an election issue this time in Azamgarh, however, in the native village of Mohammad Arif there still is an uneasy calm and hopelessness. Politicians only indulge in hollow sloganeering of human rights and make false promises of dignified life to the Muslims and nothing else.