Let’s hang Afzal Guru — II

As it fashioned a rope out of the circumstantial evidence presented to it — a few pages before giving it the shape of a noose that would fit Afzal Guru’s neck — the Supreme Court made some remarkable observations. Though no hard evidence was presented, it said the Afzal’s conduct “antecedent, contemporaneous and subsequent” (to the incident) all pointed to his guilt.

Afzal’s antecedents were fairly well known. He was a disillusioned, surrendered Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front militant from the early 1990s who had a series of handlers in the Indian security forces, including in the Rashtriya Rifles and the police.

Since his surrender, he was regularly summoned to camps where he said he was kept firmly in line through threats and torture, including, among many other things, having petrol poured in his anus. This was done under the supervision of a deputy superintendent of police, Davinder Singh.

In a recorded interview to senior journalist Parvaiz Bukhari, Singh admitted that every detail of Afzal’s version was true. He also told Bukhari, that Afzal was a “bhondu” (a slow, foolish fellow). The irony was that when he wasn’t torturing him, Singh found Afzal useful enough for him to make Afzal give his children private lessons. (Afzal had given up on his MBBS to join the militancy.)

This strange relationship is at the heart of this case. It was Singh who sent Afzal on a final “small job” to Delhi (promising him freedom thereafter from torture, if not tuitions). He was to accompany one Mohammad: the alleged leader of the terrorists who died in the shootout outside parliament. Mohammad had bought the second-hand car that was used in the attack.

Afzal’s guilt was decided primarily on his association with Mohammad, the terrorist he was introduced to by officer Davinder Singh. Singh is still serving in Srinagar, but, according to Bukhari, doesn’t move around without a little extra protection.

Afzal’s ‘contemporaneous’ actions were influenced by another interesting policeman, this time from Delhi. Rajbeer Singh, ACP, was Delhi’s encounter specialist — a reputation gained from more than 50 kills. It was under Rajbeer’s supervision that Afzal’s confessions to the police —and more importantly, to the media — were made.

The Delhi cop’s methods were well known. Afzal’s version, that Rajbeer Singh threatened to bump off his family if he didn’t do as he was told, is entirely credible. Rajbeer was instrumental in torturing and falsely framing the Delhi University professor SAR Gilani as well. And when Afzal told the media the untutored line that Gilani had nothing to do with the attack, the policeman ensured that the offending remark was not carried on a major TV channel, contributing to Gilani’s death sentence by a lower court before his eventual acquittal.

In 2008, Rajbeer Singh, decorated super cop, was shot dead by a business associate over a dispute regarding ‘investments’. It was alleged that he had amassed millions, but his wife never saw any of the money as it was entrusted with various relatives. She was given a job in the police.

The Delhi Police’s special cell took all of 17 days to crack the case. The lower court tried and sentenced the accused within a record six months. And here, in what the Supreme Court calls the “subsequent” phase, Afzal faced a third interesting character.

Justice SN Dhingra had the reputation of dispensing justice quickly. He had dealt with a number of other important cases in the past — the 1984 anti-Sikh riots case among them. In a different case, the Delhi High Court said of an order he had passed that it “not only militates against judicial conscience but also criminal jurisprudence.”

Left to Dhingra, three of the four original accused — Afzal, his cousin Shaukat Guru and Gilani — would all go to the gallows. The judge also gave Shaukat’s pregnant wife Afsan five years rigorous imprisonment.

He didn’t have much time for the discrepancies that were to lead to later acquittals. Nor, in Afzal’s case, for the defendant’s right to legal counsel. These were minor matters. After all, this was a conspiracy that aimed to “captivate entire legislature” (sic!).

Ironically, it has captivated at least one legislative assembly. In Srinagar, the Jammu and Kashmir legislature is moving a resolution to commute Afzal’s sentence.

The government of India wants him to hang. But will that satisfy the “collective conscience”? Or burden it with guilt?

Published in The Express Tribune, October 1^st,  2011.