Table Of ContentZUBAAN
an imprint of Kali for Women
128b Shahpur Jat, 1st floor
New Delhi 110 049
Email: [email protected]
Website: www.zubaanbooks.com
First published by Zubaan, 2011
Copyright © Anjum Zamarud Habib, 2011
All rights reserved
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ISBN: 978 81 89884 92 5
Ebook ISBN: 978 93 81017 40 1
This eBook is DRM-free.
Zubaan is an independent feminist publishing house based in New Delhi, India, with a strong
academic and general list. It was set up as an imprint of the well known feminist house Kali for
Women and carries forward Kali´s tradition of publishing world quality books to high editiorial and
production standards. “Zubaan” means tongue, voice, language, speech in Hindustani. Zubaan is a
non-profit publisher, working in the areas of the humanities social sciences, as well as in fiction,
general non-fiction, and books for young adults that celebrate difference, diversity and equality,
especially for and about the children of India and South Asia under its imprint Young Zubaan.
Typeset by Jojy Philip, New Delhi, 110 015
Printed at Raj Press, R-3 Inderpuri, New Delhi 110 012
Dedicated
to those prisoners who do not lose hope despite extreme torture and
humiliation;
and those who wait tirelessly for the release of their loved ones from
prison;
and to my mother, Boba, who lost her sight with the tears she shed
for me during my incarceration and who did not, sadly, live to see
this book.
And in memory of martyr Sajjad Ahmed aka Waki who was burnt
alive by Indian soldiers while in custody.
Table of Contents
Translator’s Note
MY RELEASE
APPENDICES
Translator’s Note
S H
AHBA USAIN
The first day of April is known and celebrated as fool’s day when
friends and family play pranks on each other. However, when I
checked my mail in the early hours of April 1st, one email caught my
attention; it was from Anjum Zamarud Habib who was
communicating with me after a gap of more than five years. This is
what she wrote:
After a long period I am talking to you through email. You know I was
falsely implicated in POTA [Prevention of Terrorism Act] and was
behind bars in Tihar central jail for five long years. I was totally cut off
from the outside world. My imprisonment was the result of a
conspiracy. Recently I have been released and felt the need for
getting back in touch with my well wishers. Wishing you peace and
will contact you again.
Do reply
Regards,
Anjum Zamarud Habib
I was relieved and overjoyed at the news of her release even as I
wondered if this too was a prank. I wrote back to her immediately
and also contacted friends in Kashmir and learnt that it was indeed
true: Anjum had been released from Tihar jail in December 2007.
She had completed the five year jail term of rigorous imprisonment
after she was arrested on 6 February 2003 and convicted by the
POTA trial court in Delhi.
I travelled to Srinagar the following week to meet her. All the while,
images of her arrest – I had watched these on television some five
years ago – kept running through my mind: Anjum being paraded in
front of the media, her hands held tight by policewomen on either
side of her, a ring of policemen surrounding them. I remember her
trying to utter a few words to assert her innocence but she was not
allowed to say anything; in fact she was slapped in front of the media
and her mouth was shut and gagged by a woman police sub-
inspector. She looked dazed and dishevelled – I had never seen her
look like that earlier. I had always known her as someone who
dressed well, walked firmly and spoke her mind fearlessly. I was
shell-shocked, frozen in my chair in front of the television. Wasn’t it
just a week earlier that we had met in my house when she told me,
over a cup of tea, that she was here in Delhi to organize her travel to
the US, Thailand and Pakistan for seminars that she had been
invited to? She had brought with her several files that contained
details of the work she had undertaken on behalf of Muslim
Khawateen Markaz (MKM), the organization that she headed. She
had with her documentation of the survey that she’d undertaken on
the status of widows and orphans in Kashmir and several newspaper
clippings relating to that. We discussed that afternoon how she and
MKM could release the findings of the survey and how we could
move forward in this endeavour. After reading her email, I remember
how I rushed to pull out all those files that she had left behind with
me to read – she’d wanted me to get back to her on how to take
forward the results of the survey. I also began to reflect upon and
recollect the many occasions when I had met Anjum in public
meetings, protest demonstrations and seminars in Kashmir and
elsewhere. She not only contributed with sharp political insights and
comments but had also sung songs that were apt for the occasion
and perhaps reflected her own perception as a Kashmiri who
resisted ‘Indian occupation of our watan’. One song that stood out
with its melody and lyrics at a seminar was: ‘chal udh ja re panchi ke
ab yeh des hua begana’ (Fly away oh bird as this land has now
become alien).
Her arrest under POTA in 2003 and her subsequent ‘confession’ in
the trial court created a political furore in the country with direct links
being made between the Pakistan High Commission (PHC) and the
separatist leadership of the Hurriyat Conference of which she was a
member in her capacity as the chairperson of Muslim Khawateen
Markaz. The IB (Intelligence Bureau) and the Special Cell of Delhi
Police claimed that she was a ‘courier’ as, at the time of her arrest,
she was found with cash (Rs 3 lakhs or so) that she was said to
have received from the Deputy High Commissioner of Pakistan for
the Hurriyat (separatists) in Jammu and Kashmir. It was also claimed
that her diary contained names and contact details of some ‘militant
organizations’. In a dramatic development following her arrest and
appearance in the trial court, the GoI asked the Deputy High
Commissioner of Pakistan (Jaleel Abbas Geelani) to leave the
country within 24 hours. This led the Pakistan government to
retaliate and send back Indian diplomats from the Indian High
Commission in Pakistan and relations between the two countries got
further strained. Less than two years prior to this, the two countries
had reached a near-war situation with massive troop deployment on
either side of the border following the attack on the Indian Parliament
in December 2001. Those arrested/ convicted belonged to Kashmir.
After her own arrest and conviction, much of the electronic and print
media portrayed Anjum as a dangerous Kashmiri woman terrorist
(aatankwadi) and a traitor (deshdrohi) to the country.
This incident deeply wounded us in the family and shook our bearings. But we had
to be courageous. We walked the hot, dusty streets of Delhi innumerable times,
year after year, visiting the courts (court-kachehri), visiting her in jail. Her elder
brother and nephew worked tirelessly for her release. The latter found employment
in a private company in Delhi and used the salary mainly to visit her and for
everyday legal expenses during the hearing of the case. He lived for five years in a
small flat in the old city of Delhi until her release.
I’ve known Anjum since 2000 when I began my field work in Kashmir
for a research project I had undertaken to study the impact of
political conflict/violence on the everyday life of women, both within
and outside their homes, and to understand the
social/economic/political transformation that a prolonged conflict of
this nature brought about in their lives. Also, how ordinary lives had
been touched and altered by this extraordinary situation of violence,
death, destruction and resistance. I first met her at a large public
meeting where I introduced myself and sought time to meet again.
That was the beginning of an enduring friendship.
But I had not kept up my end of the friendship. I am ashamed to
say that I never once visited her when she was in prison. And, until
we came together to work on this book, she carried the hurt of this
absence and I its guilt. Why had I not visited her even once during
her long incarceration right here in Asia’s biggest jail in Delhi? Was I
afraid? Of what, whom? Was it about being associated with her in
the past? Was it about being afraid to confront another heartrending
situation involving a Kashmiri woman that I’ve known and admired?
Was I afraid of being implicated in the case in any manner? She had
my phone numbers and email IDs in her diary that was now in the
possession of the Special Cell of Delhi Police. Should I destroy the
files she had left with me? Should I hide them? Why was I so afraid?
I continued to search for answers until I met Anjum in Srinagar
after her release. She greeted me warmly at her sister’s house
where she was staying then, with a hug that was laced with silence. I
searched for a smile of recognition in her vacant eyes that were
beginning to moisten. I heard her feeble voice that was at once
distant and hurt: why didn’t you come to see me in all these five
years, she asked me straight. I always considered you a friend but I
must have been wrong, she said. Were you afraid, had you forgotten
me? No, I protested, but yes I was afraid; not for myself but the fact
that I couldn’t bring myself to confront you in the physical and mental
state that I had heard you were in. To be honest, I was unsure of
myself; I was waiting for you I told her. We sat outside in the garden
in her sister’s house; she told me she could not sit on the floor
anymore as her knees hurt all the time. She mentioned how difficult
she had found it, at the time of her release, to lift her feet and take
the first step out of the gates of Tihar jail; ‘it felt like a ton of weight
was bearing me down.’
She continued to speak softly, almost in whispers, ruminating –
the five years in jail were much longer, a lifetime indeed where time
had taken on a different dimension both spatially and temporally,
both in psychological and emotional terms. It’s over now she said;
her confinement as well as her life. Where do I go from here, where
and how do I begin again? All the work I had done thus far seems
like a heap of waste, life has no meaning anymore, I am finished,
she said. I remained quiet as I listened to her although I was gripped
by an urgent need to talk to her, dissuade her from giving up, and
ask her questions about her life behind bars. Instead, I decided to
wait, afraid to hurt her again, unsure of what and how much I could
say or ask or whether she was willing to share her experience at all.
We moved inside when I suggested that we have a cup of tea which
she prepared readily. Her smile returned slowly, lending warmth to
her face and a sense of reassurance to me. Her niece had just
returned from college and wanted to show me the video she had
made of Anjum soon after her release, leading a local protest
demonstration of women against the atrocities of the Indian Security
Forces (ISF). This was her first public, political appearance; she was
marching ahead with other women, holding banners, raising slogans,
addressing the media and then I saw the haunting image of how she
was suddenly accosted by policewomen and thrown into their waiting
van and driven away. When I turned to look at her she said, ‘I do not
wish to waste any more time. I have returned from hell. I have to find
my feet again, find meaning in a life that has been ruined. God alone
knows what else is in store for me.’
Anjum’s sister had earlier told me that when she was first brought
home after her release, Anjum could not sleep on a mattress
anymore and for weeks she preferred to sleep on the bare floor. She
found it difficult to bathe and change into a fresh set of clothes; she
did not sit out under the open sky but wished to stay inside the room.
She found it difficult to eat what was cooked at home including her
favourite dishes. She had got so accustomed to her life in jail that the
family had to constantly remind her that she was a free person now.
As if on cue, Anjum told me ‘my family wants me to be happy, to
smile and laugh now that I am free but I don’t feel anything. I don’t
