By TwoCircles.net Staff Correspondent,
Ahmedabad: A total of 24 wards of the accused booked by the Gujarat police under draconian POTA (Prevention of Terrorist Activities Act) and given punishment ranging from death sentence to life term in three different cases including attack on Akshardham temple and murder of former minister Haren Pandya, are facing severe difficulties in paying up their tuition fees.
These students, several of them studying in well-known English medium schools, may have to drop their studies if no arrangement for their tuition fees is made. Their schools will reopen in the second week of June.
Their tuition fees and expenses on their uniforms, books and stationery were so far taken care of by Aman Samuday and Zidni Ilma Trust as their families have no resources to meet the educational expenses.
But facing fund crunch, the two organizations have withdrawn themselves from offering financial assistance to them from the coming academic session beginning on June 12. This has led the students and their families to a very difficult situation.
Among the students include Hamairabano, studying in Std II of the prestigious Trinity English Medium school at Paldi and her elder brother Muhammed Umar, a student of Std III of city’s well-known St. Xavier’s School. Their father, who worked as a radio mechanic, has been awarded life term in the Pandya murder case and 10 years of imprisonment in AMTS tiffin bomb blast case of 2003.
Other students are Muaviya Mansuri studying in Std VII in New Education School and Mansab Mansuri studying in Std III of the same school. Both are sons of Mufti Abdul Qayyum Mansuri, who has been awarded death sentence in Akshardham attack case.
While the two boys and their mother are looked after by their relatives, the latter are not in a position to pay the annual tuition fees amounting to Rs. 11,200.
Talking to TwoCircles.net here, Mufti’s wife Sumaiya said that she contacted several well-to-do members of the community to meet the educational expenses of her children but there was no favourable response so far. Sumaiya is worried what will happen when the next session begins because the school has refused to continue them in the school without fees.
Sumaiya claims that her husband was innocent and falsely implicated by the police. As statements given to the police are considered to be evidence under POTA, she said that Mufti sahib was declared guilty and given severe punishment. She said that she had challenged the punishment in the Gujarat High Court. Though final hearing in the case has concluded, the verdict is pending for the last 13 months.
Likewise, Irfan Muhammed, brother of Muhammed Saleem said that his family had no sufficient income to continue the education of Saleem’s two children Muhammed Zaid and Zainab, both studying in Anjuman Primary School in Bapunagar.
Saleem, according to Irfan, worked as a tailor in Riyadh in Saudi Arabia. However, he was arrested on August 1, 2003, the day he returned on leave and booked in Akshardham case. He was sentenced life term.
When approached, human rights activist and president of Vadodara-based Zidni Ilma Trust J S Bandukwala said that his trust was taking care of 98 children of the Godhra accused booked in Sabarmati train burning incident and the trust had no surplus funds.
However, he said that he was still making effort to mobilize funds through philanthropists of ahmedabad but so far there was no success. He appealed to people to come forward to extend their helping hand to these children so that their education was not discontinued. Bandukwala can be reached at [email protected]