This morning I woke up to the news that Yakub Memon’s last mercy plea had been turned down and that he would be hanged a little before 7 am at Nagpur jail for his role in the 1993 Mumbai blasts.
With unease, I stepped out for my morning walk.
I couldn’t help but notice a change around my neighbourhood. Yesterday, one or two of the street corners in my neighbourhood had garlanded photos of APJ Abdul Kalam, former President of India, who passed away on Monday. Today, almost every second street had a photo frame of the People’s President, decorated with flowers and candles. The visible outpour of affection was heartening. At one of these corners I saw something that warmed the heart.
After about half a minute, she was on her way. It didn’t look planned. The homage was as instinctive as the small prayer and gesture, including placing a hand over the heart, lips or forehead that many of us do when we see a temple, mosque or a church.
For me, these are two different Indias. One refused to save a man from the gallows despite his desperate pleas. In hanging Memon, India has lost an opportunity to show that a pardon is more powerful than punishment; and that people could be reformed. The other, transcends petty religious barriers in collectively mourning the loss, and rightly so, of another.
Dichotomy
Yes, Yakub Memon was guilty of assisting his brother Tiger Memon and others in planning the 1993 blasts that killed 257 innocent people. My blood boiled as I read a newspaper’s recount of how Memon and others meticulously planned the barbaric act. But, as the late B Raman, who headed the Pakistan desk at the RAW, had mentioned in an article that Yakub Memon had surrendered to the Indian authorities and helped in the investigations by giving information about Pakistan’s involvement.
I quote Raman’s article: “He (Yakub Memon) cooperated with the investigating agencies and assisted them by persuading some other members of the Memon family to flee from the protection of the ISI in Karachi to Dubai and surrender to the Indian authorities. The Dubai part of the operation was coordinated by a senior officer of the IB, who was then on deputation to the Ministry of External Affairs. Neither the RAW nor I had any role in the Dubai part of the operation.
“The cooperation of Yakub with the investigating agencies after he was picked up informally in Kathmandu and his role in persuading some other members of the family to come out of Pakistan and surrender constitute, in my view, a strong mitigating circumstance to be taken into consideration while considering whether the death penalty should be implemented.”
And then Raman, who was the head of the counter-terrorism division of the RAW, concludes: “There is not an iota of doubt about the involvement of Yakub and other members of the family in the conspiracy and their cooperation with the ISI till July 1994. In normal circumstances, Yakub would have deserved the death penalty if one only took into consideration his conduct and role before July 1994.
“But if one also takes into consideration his conduct and role after he was informally picked up in Kathmandu, there is a strong case for having second thoughts about the suitability of the death penalty in the subsequent stages of the case.”
Was this important document discussed in court? There has been a lot debate on the constitution of the Supreme Court bench that presided over the case; did Yakub’s religion have a role to play in the subsequent judgement?
Also, the petition by eminent citizens to the President noted: “His execution will weaken the case against the involvement of the Pakistan agencies as there are no other witnesses available.”
As a country we seemed to have been polarised by this case. As Member of Parliament Shashi Tharoor wrote, “The news of the hanging of Yakub Memon has been greeted across the country with reactions ranging from dismay to scarcely-concealed bloodlust.”
Beyond boundaries
As I write this, APJ Abdul Kalam is on his last journey. Earlier this week, hours after his demise, messages on him and forwards citing instances from his life flooded my Facebook feed and WhatsApp groups I’m part of.
A friend on Facebook, though, suggested that the outpouring of the grief across the country was less about the love for the man, and was more “a loud attempt by a guilty nation to wash off the sins of racial discrimination that it has embraced as the mainstream culture in recent years.” There were howls of protest against this statement and many said that the public display of grief was, instead, because of the respect the people had for the former President, who had become a national icon and a role model. “Religion had nothing to do with this respect,” was one of the replies. I would like to believe the same.
Despite doubts about his scientific expertise (with a few hinting that Kalam may not have been as great a scientist as he is made out to be) and allegations that the BJP used him to appease the minorities, Kalam was an endearing personality and loved by everyone. He lived a frugal life and was not lured or trapped by the luxuries that come with high posts. Instead, he used the position to reach out to children and the youth, even after his Presidency. That cemented his legacy. And that is why that middle-aged woman I saw in the morning wouldn’t have been the only one in the country to have elevated him to God-like status.
I like this India.