Udupi: 'Arrested Akbar Ali Innocent' Claims Family
by Durga Digitals
Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (SP)
Udupi, Jan 16: Akbar Ali (28) a resident of of Mallar Kote Road near here, was taken into custody by the Corps of Detectives policemen on January 9, suspecting his role as a member of banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI).
The policemen also have allegedly collected details of a few people from the coast who have extended help to Ali in his activities, by culling the details from his mobile phone. Investigations are on.
But, speaking to daijiworld Udupi correspondent on Friday January 16, Ali's father Amanulla Usman and wife Mariamma expressed their resentment at the arrest and detention of Ali by the policemen without providing any information. "The policemen had taken him away on the night of January 9, duly promising to release him in a couple of days. We are being kept in the dark about his whereabouts and what they are doing with him. He is innocent. He is not involved with any terrorist activities. Our family is devastated. He should be released immediately," they demanded.
Mariamma said that she along with her husband used to work for Ahmed Bawa from Haleangady in Kuduregundi of Koppa. "The policemen had visited us several times in the past to enquire about the activities that took place in Kuduregundi. As there was opposition locally for my inter-caste marriage with Ali, we had been living away from our native place. We lived in Shimoga, Koppa and then Kuduregundi. I attended to cooking duties there while Akbar was attending to gardening work," she explained.
Mariamma confirmed that a few youth used to visit Ahmed Bawa's Kuduregundi residence often and that she does not know what they did or why they had come there. "They usually conversed in Urdu and Hindi. I do not understand Urdu, but can understand Hindi a little," she confessed.
After Ahmed Bawa was arrested by the policemen, Akbar and Mariamma came back to their native place from Kuduregundi and got their marriage registered. Akbar Ali who was working for a fish transport tempo, was arrested by the policemen on the night of January 9, Mariamma said.
Akbar Ali, who used to work as the driver of a school van in Shirva, had loved and married Mariamma, a Hindu working as teacher in the same school, in spite of facing stiff resistance from various quarters. The couple had then left their jobs and lived at different places away from their native place.