Search the Internet          Tips

Writer Arundhati Roy supports
Parliament attack accused

Basharat Peer in New Delhi

Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy on Thursday joined a host of academicians, lawyers and human rights activists in defence of suspended Delhi University lecturer Syed Abdul Rahman Geelani, a co-accused in the December 13 terrorist attack on Parliament.

The author of The God of Small Things is now part of the All India Defence Committee for SAR Geelani, a group that boasts of such names as academician Rajni Kothari, social worker Aruna Roy and lawyer Nandita Haksar.

The trial in the Parliament attack case is on and the committee on Thursday organised a meeting in Delhi to inform the media about the facts of the case.

"It is our concern for human rights and civil liberties that motivated me and others to come out in defence of Dr Geelani. He had no history of being involved in any crime or anti-national activities. There is no doubt that he has been framed," Professor Rajni Kothari, who heads the committee, told rediff.com.

Arundhati Roy, during the time she spent in Tihar jail in a contempt of court case, had met Navjot aka Afshan Guru, a Sikh girl from Delhi, who is married to another Parliament attack case accused Showket Guru.

"She was five or six months pregnant, her condition was horrifying. It took me 45 minutes to get her to speak. I asked her if she had a lawyer. All she managed to say was: 'Mere paas towliaya nahin hai' ('I don't have a towel')," Roy said.

The writer-activist said she is convinced that Geelani has been framed. "The people who framed him are the real terrorists. We need to come out in defence of Dr Geelani not only till he is acquitted, but will have to see that the policemen who booked him are punished too. We need to win for the sake of democracy and civil liberties...at least once, at least one case," she said.

Criminal lawyer Seema Gulati, who is defending Geelani, maintained that the police investigations in the case have been shoddy and that there is no concrete evidence linking Geelani to the attack on Parliament.

Geelani was arrested because his cell phone number was found in the call records of another co-accused.

"That accused happened to be from Geelani's home town and had studied in Delhi University around the same time as Geelani...they knew each other," Gulati said.

Geelani's wife, who described herself as a housewife, narrated how she and her children were picked up by the police on December 15, soon after her husband was arrested. "We were taken to the Lodhi colony police station and policemen tortured him [her husband] in front of me and the children...they wanted him to confess," she said.

The Central Universities Teachers Association president Prof Kamal Mitra Chenoy, who was present at the meeting, said the teachers' fraternity stands solidly behind Geelani. He also apologised for his and other teachers' initial reluctance to support Geelani's case.

Complete Coverage: The Attack on Parliament

Back to top

Tell us what you think of this report