A grandnephew of Maulana Abul Kalam Azad – a senior political leader of the Indian independence movement and an opponent of partition of India – has claimed that he was severely harassed and almost arrested for “no reason” by officials of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), during his visit to Lahore in June this year.
In an article carried by The Statesman, Firoz Bakht Ahmed, the visitor, wrote of an ordeal during his tour of Lahore with his family in June, claiming that the Pakistani government, especially the military establishment, was extremely critical of Muslims living in and loyal to India, saying as much that they were looked upon with utter hate and abhorrence.
“It’s not only Pakistani Hindus who routinely narrate horror tales. Indian Muslims are terrorized too while on visits to Pakistan as tourists as they are generally taken to be RAW agents or spies. The problem with the Pakistani administration is that it can’t tolerate Hindus and more than them, pious Muslims who profess their loyalty to India. My family and I realized this to our dismay during our recent visit as tourists to Lahore,” he wrote.
Ahmed said Pakistanis were intolerant of Muslims who swore allegiance to India.
“I implore Muslims of India never and ever to venture into Pakistan as tourists since there is no guarantee that they will return unless they are part of some government delegation. Pakistani authorities hate Indian Muslims and that is the truth,” the article said. He said his hounding started at Wagah while crossing into Pakistan.
Reporting his ordeal, Ahmed said his children had insisted going to Joy Land children’s amusement park in Lahore Cantonment during their stay at Aitchison College during the Lahore tour. “It so happened that on 9 June, 2012, the fifth day of our stay in Lahore, the children wanted to go for rides at Joy Land Park around 5pm.
While we were about to enter the park, we were asked by ISI sleuths (in civilian clothes) who had been following us right from Wagah border all these days without our knowledge, to divert our three-wheeler towards the Sarwar Road Police Station.”
Ahmed said his family was told at the police station that they had entered a “prohibited” area, despite his wife’s protest that they were only tourists and there was no notice board to ward them off.
“But the officers had sinister designs and had already readied papers to lock us up. The fact remains that even if some tourist goes to the amusement park unknowingly, he lands in the hands of the ISI only to be put behind bars indefinitely. Time and again, while grilling us, the officers kept repeating that Pakistani tourists received even worse treatment at the hands of Indian agencies, but I kept denying that,” so said Ahmed.
“Our passports, visas and other papers were picked up by the policemen” from our abode in Aitchison College, he said. “The ISI spies had plotted impeccably to snare us. Our arrest documents had been prepared and passports and other papers confiscated. We were deeply shaken.”
But Ahmed said help came through the college bursar, a retired army man. His assurance to ISI officials of the family being mere tourists was not enough, so Ahmed said he had to call the editor of a Pakistani English daily.
He and his family were released after five hours “after tendering a written apology”.
“While going back to Delhi, customs officials teamed with five ISI officers grilled us for three hours, ransacked our bags and gave our camera, our cellphones, wallets and external hard disc a thorough going-over. Even medicines and my shaving kit weren’t spared. All the while, I remained worried that something would be planted in our luggage to make a case for arresting us,” he said.
The writer said he “heaved a sigh of relief after we got out of the clutches of these ISI megalomaniacs. Having crossed over to the Indian side, the sight of Sikh customs officers came as a big relief”.