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Posted Online on Monday, 25 June 2007 14:35 IST

Public hearing on Police Firing, Fake Encounters and Police Harassment of the Muslim Community

Document

The Milli Gazette

24 June 2007

The Muslim community, especially the Muslim Youth, have been the target of harassment and terror at the hand of the Andhra Pradesh state police after the Mecca Masjid bomb blast in Hyderabad on 18 May 2007. In fact, the profiling of the Muslim youth as a source of disturbance, unrest and potential threat to the security and safety has been going on for quite some time along with the hightened activity aimed at the so-called war against terror. The Mecca Masjid blast became a convenient tool in the hands of the state and the police to further persecute the Muslim community.

It is significant to note at this juncture that the media was abuzz with stories about the fake encounter killings of Sohrabuddin Sheikh and his wife Kausar Bi, which was the handiwork of the Gujarat police in connivance with the Hyderabad police top brass. The Supreme Court had taken active interest in this case in which three top IPS officers were already under arrest were and being questioned. In fact, fingers were being pointed at the criminal involvement of the top police brass of Hyderabad and Gujarat and the highest court of this country was forced to intervene as a result of the sheer weight of evidence against the guardians of the law who had become its prime violators.

The incidents that followed the Mecca Masjid blast were very intriguing to anyone’s commonsense. The bomb blast in the mosque, which is more than 500 years old, during the Friday prayers aroused passions among the people who had come to offer prayers. And it was natural that they would come in large numbers to protest against this ghastly act of terror. Instead of dealing with this protest with the kind of empathy it deserves, the police went on a rampage and indulged in indiscriminate firing thus killing and injuring more people than were originally killed by the blast.

It is also rare because the bomb blast took place in a Masjid where thousands of Muslims offer Namaz and Muslims lost their lives in police firing after the bomb blast. Another great fantasy that the Andhra Pradesh police weaved was the involvement of some "foreign" Muslim terrorist groups. To boost this claim the ever-alert police managed to round up a local innocent youth for interrogation.

Top police officials of AP, due to their proximity to the Hindutva forces and for personnel promotions and benefits, are targeting the Muslim youth, branding them as terrorists having connections with terrorist groups working from outside India or with the ISI. These officers are indulging in fake encounters of Muslim youth.

In this context, the Civil Liberties Monitoring Committee, India (CLMCI) on 3 June 2007 organized a Public hearing at Hyderabad on the police firing after the bomb blast at Mecca Masjid, fake encounters and the police harassment of the Muslim community. The kith and kin of the victims of fake encounters, Mecca Masjid bomb blast and representatives of various peoples organizations appeared before the jury of the Public Hearing and gave the facts, expressed their concerns and grievances. Dr SAR Geelani (Professor, Delhi University), Bojja Tarakam (Senior Advocate of A.P High Court and President of Republican Party of India), Dr Rehana Sultana (President, CLMCI), Gaddar (revolutionary singer), Prof Abdul Raheem head of the department of journalism Osmania University and other prominent citizens constituted of the jury.

It was very difficult for the organizers to bring together the victims and eye-witnesses of bomb blast, victims of harassment and fake encounters to the public hearing due to the hurdles created by the local police. One of Jury members, Dr. SAR Geelani who had reached Hyderabad from Delhi, was not given the usual security provided by the state ever since the attempt on his life. On the day when he arrived at Hyderabad, the Delhi commandant of the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), which was providing him security in Delhi had already talked to his counterparts in the city. Despite the information from the Delhi office of the CISF there was no security for him from the Hyderabad airport. Constant calls from Dr. SAR Geelani asking for security cover fell on deaf ears. Only on the last day, two hours before he was about to leave after the hearing, security appeared maintaining they had just received orders. The same police who had feigned ignorance about his arrival in the city had two days in advance reached the hotel where he was supposed to stay to harass the hotel staff.

Public Hearing on Fake Encounters

The Public Hearing started with the report by the kith and kin of those who had died in the fake encounters as well as people under illegal detention. Sister of Mujahid Saleem (who was killed by the police during the arrest of Maulana Naseeruddin) told the jury that harassment, fake encounters, illegal detention of Muslim youth had increased sharply since the days of the demolition of Babri Masjid. There are numerous cases filed under POTA and TADA. After the Mecca Masjid bomb blast, police harassment of Muslim youths increased manifold. Sangh Parivar is working in the background to harass the people with the help of police officers. The Gujarat police arrested Maulana Naseeruddin under TADA. He was taken to Gujarat with a malicious case framed against him. Local Muslims opposed the arrest of Naseeruddin.

"It was the police brutality that ensued in this process which killed my brother. Gujarat police with the help of AP police wanted to kill Naseeruddin in a fake encounter, but their plan was foiled due to the concerted efforts of the Muslim community in Hyderabad. I strongly condemn the communal approach of the police officers, especially their single-minded targeting of Muslims."

Yasir, son of Maulana Naseeruddin, narrated the illegal custody and harassment by police of his father. Naseeruddin is now in the high security ward of the Sabarmathi Central jail, Ahmedabad. Even after three years of his arrest no trial was conducted. The charges against him are only that he made provocative statements while the reality is that Praveeen Togadia of the Viswa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bal Thackery of the Shiv Sena had indulged in making highly provocative, religiously-sensitive statements. Both of them are still moving freely, with proper security at government cost but my father Naseeruddin was put behind bars without any proper reason. The entire case, going by the law of the land is wrong, illegal, incorrect and has scant regard for moral principles. My father was arrested only because he unflinchingly opposes US imperialism. He opposes the unilateral attack of America on the people of the world. Indian rulers do not like the people who question the anti-people nature of US imperialism and put all those people who resist US exploitation behind bars. We, the family members of Naseeruddin with all grief, sorrow and anger have lost hope of getting justice from the judiciary.

Mr. Raghunath, advocate of AP high court and Civil liberties activist, narrated the incidents of fake encounters in Andhra Pradesh: the Andhra Pradesh police started fake encounters as a strategy and policy to wean away any form of dissent way back in 1968. Judgment on Public Interest Litigation (PIL) against fake encounters is reserved by the AP high court. So far no FIR has been filed against the police involved in fake encounters notwithstanding the fact that this is statutorily binding. It has become very difficult even to perform the last rites of the persons killed in fake encounters. The strategy used by the AP Police, one is forced to say with consternation, has become the model for fake encounters which is a blatant violation of the law and the constitution.



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