Almost every other day, newspapers are agog with stories about 'dreaded Muslim terrorists' being nabbed across the country. At the same time, savage violence unleashed by Hindutva groups continues unabated without any effective steps being taken against them. In the ongoing 'war on terror', globally as well as within India, Muslims have come to be framed collectively as 'terrorists', while terrorism engaged in by people belonging to other communities is generally condoned or ignored altogether or, at least, is not described in the same terms.
In India today, Muslim youths are being indiscriminately picked up and tortured by the police, in many cases falsely accused of being terrorists. Many of them have been languishing in jails for years now and yet no one ever seems to care.
Take the case of Muhammad Parvez Abdul Qayyum Shaikh of Gujarat. According to his aunt, Qamar Jahan, on April 2, 2003, while he was on his way to fit a water appliance, he was arrested by CBI officer Tarun Barot and others. For three days his family knew nothing of his whereabouts. On the fourth day, she says, 'We saw the news and realised that Parvez had been arrested under allegations of having a Chinese-made pistol and some gun powder. However, this powder is used for cleaning the Aqua Guard machines.'
Parvez, she says, was brutally beaten and tortured by the officers, with Officer Vanzara allegedly asking Parvez to refer to him as Khuda (God) and beating him ruthlessly. While in jail they forced him to sign on blank papers. He was reportedly taken by the CBI officers to Gandhinagar where he was further tortured for 21 days. He was then charged in the DCP-6 case, tiffin bomb blast case and in the Haren Pandya murder case (the last mentioned of which, incidentally, Pandya's own father accuses Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi
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as having instigated). He was sentenced to 14 years in jail for the last-mentioned case, although his aunt maintains that he is innocent.