Plucking petals: For his family, APS gardener leaves a world withered

Muhammad Hussain was on duty with his colleagues when the gunmen struck.

PESHAWAR: Paramedics at Combined Military Hospital telephoned villagers of Panam Dheri on the outskirts of Peshawar on Tuesday, December 16, saying there was an urgent need of blood. Announcements were made on loud speakers that all young men should come forward. And so, a group of boys and men gathered outside the local mosque, hired a pickup van and reached CMH.

Among them was Muhammad Naheed, who only found out while donating blood that it was for those injured in a massacre at Army Public School (APS), the school where Naheed’s younger brother Muhammad Hussain, 26, worked as a gardener.

A sudden surge of panic taking over, Naheed called his other brother Muhammad Zahid and father Shamsheer to tell them about the incident. All of them tried Hussain’s cellphone number, but neither got any response. They rushed to APS where soldiers told them they should go check out CMH and Lady Reading Hospital (LRH) and search among the injured and dead.



The frantic search lasted for hours. In the evening, they finally got a call from CMH: Muhammad Hussain was dead, his body waiting to be collected from the hospital.

Hussain was the youngest of four brothers. He was working at the APS as a gardener for the past eight years. His brother Zahid told The Express Tribune Hussain was busy working in the lawn when the Taliban terrorists stormed the premises and started firing indiscriminately.

“Another gardener told us later that they were all together and wanted to drink tea. And then, the rampage began. “Someone said they were the Taliban, but Muhammad Hussain said they were army men and ignored them. Soon the attackers started firing and Hussain was hit. He died on the spot,” said Zahid.

He added the other gardeners managed to escape, with one of them scaling an iron gate to seek refuge in the tubewell room. Trying hard as they did, the gunmen could not tear the gate down.

“Hussain had been shot thrice and his body was shifted to CMH once the operation was over,” said the elder brother, adding Hussain was a father of three daughters.

“His eldest daughter Iqra is six years old while the younger one, Aneesa, is just three. He was a religious man and was happy with his life despite the fact that we are really poor. I myself work on daily wage and our father is a mechanic at Golf Club where he repairs machinery used in gardening. I don’t understand what kind of religion these terrorists follow as at least our religion Islam does not allow killing women, children and elderly [even] in war.”

Published in The Express Tribune, December 26^th, 2014.