CurrentAffairs
Silk Road:A mother knows when to mourn
By Anwar Iqbal, UPISouth Asian Affairs Analyst
WASHINGTON, (UPI) -- I went to the condemnedman's home in the afternoon, hours before his death and stayedthere until his body arrived from the prison. I don't know whatwent through his mind when the hangman was taking him to the gallows.I wonder how he felt dying when everything in his body told himthat he was fit to live for many years. He was in his twentieswhen hanged. He had a strong body, a healthy mind, a young faceand jet-black hair.
His limbs were strong, his veins were fullof blood, his eyes were shining, his heart was beating vigorouslyand yet he had to die.
The Pakistani government said Tooti wasinvolved in a hijacking. It was back in the 1980s when anothergeneral, Zia ul Huq, ruled Pakistan. He never pardoned a condemnedprisoner, not even the country's former Prime Minister ZulfikarAli Bhutto who was also hanged like a common criminal.
I don't know whether Tooti, who lived nearthe Pakistani capital, Islamabad, was guilty but the general'scourt found him so and ordered that he be hanged. The death ofa young person, whether stabbed in an alley, killed in a battleor hanged on the gallows, is cruel. At least that's how I feel.To me nothing could justify destroying something as beautifulas a young life.
When I arrived there with a group of journalists,we were first made to sit outside his home under a canopy calledshamiana. His family received us with courage.
They were trying not to think about himand his death cell. Instead some of them even tried to discusstrivial things like politics and weather. But the fear of theinevitable was always there. In fact its presence was felt evenmore when it was not discussed.
For a few minutes everybody would try toact normally. The visitors would pretend as if they were therefor a social call.
Tooti's relatives would speak to them politely.And then right in the middle of a conversation someone would breakdown and start sobbing and the whole facade would come tumblingdown. The grim fact that they were there to mourn a man who wasnot yet dead would come out with all its grimness, and everybodywould try to hide the painful embarrassment that he or she felt.
In the beginning the women were sittinginside the house. We could hear them crying but could not seethem. Then an old woman came out, looked at the sun and shouted:"God, it's already evening!" And everybody lost control.All the women came out, crying loudly and beating their chests.Men rushed to comfort them but some of them also broke down. Thevisitors watched silently, tears rolling down their faces.
Later, when we went inside with the body,we realized why the old woman had to look at the sun to know thetime.
Somebody had removed all the clocks fromthe house to prevent Tooti's mother from calculating the remaininghours of her son's life.
For about half an hour the men and the womencried together. Then, tired of crying and beating their chest,they huddled under the shamiana, sobbing quietly. Some women wentinside again. Others stayed out. Emotions calmed for a while butonly for a while.
This time it was another woman -- the condemnedman's mother -- who came out crying. Somewhere she found an oldalbum -- all his photographs in the house had been removed withthe clocks but someone forgot to hide this album. When she sawhis pictures, she could not control herself. She came out crying,holding the album close to her chest. Other relatives rushed totake it away from her but could not. The mother fainted.
Those standing around her made a small circleto let the air through. Others started fanning her with whateverthey were holding. Then they carried her inside where, we weretold, she remained unconscious for several hours.
Her grief devastated everybody. People wereso overwhelmed with sorrow that they could not even cry. Theyjust sat there in utter disbelief. Many of them wanted to helpthe grieving family.
They were relatives and friends of the youngman who was still alive but was going to die soon. Most of themwere tall and well built, strong enough to do anything. Some ofthem were influential people. But there was little they coulddo to save him. He was condemned to die and they knew that. Theyalso knew that they were helpless. The grief had broken theirhearts and their helplessness had shattered their confidence.They sat like a flock of lambs, watching one of them being pickedout by the butcher but unable to move to save him.
According to tradition one of the neighborsbrought tea and some food for the grieved family. Some had teabut nobody touched the food. This long and agonizing wait continuedwith occasional sobbing and crying.
The clocks had been removed, but time didnot stop. While his friends and relatives were waiting at hishome, the time had come for the young man to leave his cell. Nobodyloves his prison, but to him even his death cell must have seemedto be his last refuge.
He must have tried to stay inside the cellfor as long as he could. He may have resisted going out. Theymay have had to drag him out. He may have fainted with fear, orhe may have walked bravely to the gallows, holding his head high.I have been told by those who have watched people being hangedthat some have to be carried on stretchers, while others go singingand dancing. Some keep on pleading their innocence. Some go recitingthe prayers. Others rebel and refuse to listen to the priest whocomes for the last service.
We will never know how our young man wentto the gallows. He must have been offered new clothes, as is thecustom, to wear on his last day on earth. He must have been askedto shave and shower. We don't know whether he accepted the offeror not. I am told that on his last day, a condemned prisoner isnot forced to do anything. They only force him to die. So we canguess that our prisoner had to leave his cell, willingly or unwillingly.He must have said his last prayers because we are told that hehad become religious in his last days.
A priest, a doctor and a magistrate willhave also accompanied him on his last journey, as the law requires.The priest to try comfort him with promises for a better lifein the hereafter. The magistrate would have ensured that legalrequirements were met before he was hanged. And the doctor? Whatdoes a doctor do? Does he declare a prisoner fit to die? Or doeshe just declare him dead after he is hanged? I wonder how thedoctors feel doing something that goes against their training.They are supposed to cure patients, not to supervise hangings.
Then he will have climbed the few stepsthat take a condemned person to the gallows. Again we don't knowwhether he climbed the steps on his own or needed support. Thenthe hangman put a black hood over his face, tightened the nooseand given him the last push. And with one movement of his handsanother life came to an end. Then the doctor must have checkedthe young man for the last time and declared him fit to be returnedto his family, dead.
All this must have happened while we werewaiting for the news at the young man's home. We will never knowwhat went through his head when he was walking, or being carried,from his cell to the gallows. Did he think of his home? Afterall it was only a few miles from his prison. Did he think of hisfriends and relatives who were sitting at his home, waiting forhim so that they could perform their last duties, bury him andreturn to whatever they were doing before he died?
We the mourners awoke from our grief onlywhen those who had gone to the prison to fetch him arrived withhis body. And then all that happens at a death happened again.People cried. Some were so shocked that they fainted. Others startedbeating their chests again. Most of the mourners wept silently.Friends and neighbors comforted his family.
The body was washed, wrapped in a shroudand taken to a nearby mosque for the funeral prayer. Then it wastaken to the graveyard and buried. His friends and relatives returnedhome to mourn. We journalists returned to our offices to writethe story.