Sub-title: Hot iron rods were placed
on his chest and between his legs
Author:
Publications: Gomantak Times, Punjabi
Date: May 30, 2001
With his body scarred for life but
spirit unbroken, Mehboob Elahi Shamshi survived agonising years in a dark
and, dingy Pakistan cell to tell his tales of the gaol house.
Horrid memories of the Pakistan
prison galvanised this Indian spy to seek freedom for scores of others
like him still languishing in captivity.
Sitting under the blazing sun on
the pavement in Kolkata's College Street area selling showpieces crafted
from wood Shamshi's tears mingle with rivulets of sweat that stream down
his cheeks as he reminisces about his arrest.
On June 23, 1977 Dhamim was arrested
on charges of spying for India and was given 20 years in jail.
"I had to face the worst forms of
torture in Pakistan jails. Hot iron rods were placed on my chest
and between my legs. I was kept standing most of the time and not
allowed to relieve myself", he says breaking down and pointing to the scars
all over his body.
"There are many Prisoners of War
rotting in Pakistan prisons. Even though I was able to come out after 20
years, they will never taste the joy of freedom. One must do something
for them," says Shamshi.
He plans to sit on a dharna to make
his voice heard if the proposed visit by Pakistan's Chief Executive Gen
Parvez Musharaf takes place.
Shamshi also plans to start a signature
campaign soon for the release of the POWs and intends to meet Gen. Musharraf.
At present, he is trying to eke
out a living by peddling wooden showpieces in the city streets after buying
them from Shahranpur in Uttar Pradesh.
"I am hardly able to make both ends
meet by selling these things. But that's how it is," he says.
"I was in the Pakistan army as a
welder. But when I came to see my ailing mother in the city I was engaged
as a spy by an Indian agency in early 1977. I sneaked into the Ferozepur
border with two other colleagues. But luck ran out at some distance in
to Pakistan territory I was arrested by 619 Field Intelligence Unit, a
Pakistani security agency. I was imprisoned on charges of espionage,"
he says.
On August 7, 1980, Shamshi was sentenced
to 14 years' rigorous imprisonment. He was ferried from one jail to another
in places like Karachi, Sindh, Peshwar, Lahore and Faislabad.
He was denied water on gruelling
summer days and not allowed a wink of sleep at night. "I used to
pray for death. Though I fell ill several times, no doctor ever came to
see me," he recalls.
Shamshi wrote to the Indian. Embassy
at Islamabad, the Amnesty International and the Pakistan Human Rights Commission,
complaining of human rights violation.
The then Indian Consul General at
Karachi, Naresh Mohali, wrote to him on October 6,1986. 'We are sorry to
learn about the adverse condition in which you, are being kept. We are
taking immediate action to move the Pakistan authorities to allow us consular
access, so that one, of our officers can visit you and, attend to your
problems," the letter said.
Mohan also wrote to the Pakistan
government demanding his release.
Shamshi's case came up for hearing
at, the Pakistan Supreme Court and the Pakistan Human Rights Commission,
Justice. Nasim Hussain Shah, the then Chief Justice of the Pakistan
Supreme Court, and the chairman of the Human Rights Commission, reprimanded
the authorities for keeping him in custody even though he had completed
his term on November 29, 1991 and ordered his release.
"On the midnight of December 1,
1996, I along with ten others, including some women were surreptiously
moved out of the Karachi Central Jail, put on an army jeep and dumped on
the border by the Pakistan Rangers. We were then left to cross over
to India through Barmer in Rajasthan," he recounts.
But some distance into the Indian
Territory he was detained at the Gadra Police Station for "infiltrating"
into India.
Police did not believe his story
and it was a life of confinement for his again. It was only when
a senior official came to probe his case that Shamshi was released.
Later, his case was dropped by the
Barmer court.
Mehboob wants to pen his memoirs
one day and tell the world his story.
Asked if he would not want to get
justice for all that he had endured, he says with a sigh, "What's the use?
I have lost 20 years of life and no amount of compensation can bring back
those days."
Shamshi would rather like the Pakistan
Government, as a "goodwill gesture", to release the Indian POWs arrested
during the 1971 war.
