Has every Muslim in India become vulnerable to be branded as a terrorist or Pakistani by our security and intelligence agencies? Yes, one would say going by the incidents taking place every day. If yesterday (October 8) a Hindu Marathi family had not shown brave and social activist Teesta Seetalvad had not intervened promptly a young Muslim from UP living in Nasik could have been branded as a Pakistani or ISI agent, reports TwoCircles.net on October 10.
Rahman Nawaz Khan is a 26-year-old man from Farrukhabad district in Uttar Pradesh. He is living in Nasik for over one year and trying to make his career in modelling and cinema. He is staying with a Hindu Marathi family, with whom his family has close friendship. What happened to him yesterday evening has terrified the young man. More than a dozen people in plainclothes (they told him they were from Crime Branch) came up to him and rudely asked him to go with them to the police station. They told him he was a Pakistani and anti-national.
Khan showed them his college certificates and driving licence to prove he is an Indian national but they did not budge. As Khan got terrified he called his aunty, Mrs. Sushma Nitin Wavre. Hers is a reputed family in Nasik and contacts with Nashik Mayor, Khan said. She told the men that she knows him and his family for the last 10 years and if this boy was of any bad character how she could allow him to stay at her home. “They were not disclosing their identity. When my aunty insisted, one of them said they were from Crime Branch,” Khan said. My auntie did not allow them to take me away and called in local police. The local police, Khan said, favoured the Marathi family.
Khan then called his elder brother Faisal Khan, who lives in Delhi. He is attached with some social and human rights organisations like Asha Parivar and National Alliance of People’s Movement. Faisal Khan immediately phoned some eminent civil and human rights activists like Teesta Seetalvad, Medha Patkar and Sandeep Panday. Seetalvad telephoned top police officials in Mumbai and Nasik. And only then Nawaz Khan could be saved. “If I had no such high contacts, I would have been branded a Pakistani and put in jail,” he said.
Nawaz Khan was born and completed his primary education in Kaimgang, Farrukhabad district of UP. He did matriculation and intermediate from Jamia Millia Islamia in Delhi, and graduation from IGNOU. And then a certificate in Theatre from Shri Ram Centre of Performing Arts in New Delhi. He has also worked with Theatre and Education for two years and a half.
His family belongs to a family of freedom fighters. He has never been involved in any crime. “My father, my brother and I have never been involved even in a petty crime,” Khan said adding that the incident has shaken him from inside. He, however, has vowed to take the issue seriously and through media he will put pressure on the top police officials to take action against the culprits.