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After acquittal Akshardham accused pens book on 11 years of travails in jail

by IBNS 10 Apr 2015, 11:15 am

#Mufti Abdul Qayyum

Ahmedabad, Apr 10 (IBNS) Mufti Abdul Qayyum, acquitted by the Supreme Court in the 2002 Akshardham temple terror attack last year, has penned a book recounting his personal account of injustice and travails that he faced for 11 years in jail for a crime he had not committed.

The book will be released next week.
 
Titled 'Gyarah  Saal Salakhon Ke Peeche', the book, as Qayyum says, is the account of a life branded as a terrorist without evidence.  "This book is not just for the Muslims, it is for the most oppressed class of the country. If through my book, even one person is spared from state sponsored excesses then I will be happy that I have achieved something,"  Qayyum told NDTV.

He was 29 at the time of arrest in 2003 - a year after the attack on the Akshardham temple.
 
Police claimed to have recovered a letter written by Qayyum from the possession of  two terrorists, who were killed in the gun battle with security forces.

A lower court in Gujarat later convicted Qayyum and two others, sentencing them to death.  But on May 17 last year, the top court acquitted him of all the charges.

When Qayyum, now 40, was arrested his son was barely ten months old. All the 11 years he was in jail his wife struggled hard to run the family bearing the stigma of being a "terrorist's wife."
 
"As my son grew older, his only constant question was about his father. Every day before going to school he would always ask; when will father come home. Every moment was filled with pain,"  Qayyum's wife told NDTV.

 

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