-The Hindu The ground beneath Arundhati Roy’s seismic claims on the Parliament House attack, is shaky — to say the least “Everyone is entitled to their own opinions”, the American politician Daniel Patrick Moynihan — among others — is credited with having said, “but not to his own facts.” Muhammad Afzal Guru’s execution on Saturday morning — a grim spectacle, where the Indian government disgraced itself by denying his family a last meeting,...
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Rich slogans, quiet secrets
-The Hindustan Times The hanging of the 2001 Parliament attack accused Afzal Guru in Delhi’s Tihar Jail last week evoked a range of diverse emotions. While Guru’s Sopore-based family accused the Union government of not informing them about the execution, the State rejected the charge. A senior Supreme Court lawyer questioned the timing of the execution, saying that the Centre decided to hang Guru at this time because several important assembly...
More »The role of Pranab Mukherjee in Afzal Guru’s hanging-Smita Gupta
-The Hindu In a record of sorts, two convicts have been executed in less than 3 months The execution of two convicts on charges of terror in less than three months — a record of sorts in recent times — has unwittingly put the spotlight on President Pranab Mukherjee, who took office last July. His quick rejection of the mercy petitions of Ajmal Kasab, the only survivor among the perpetrators of 26/11,...
More »In Tihar, officials feel ‘tinge of sorrow’-Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar
-The Hindu ‘Al vida’, said Afzal Guru to his executioner, who had himself bid him good bye with the same words a few seconds earlier. And then as the executioner pulled a lever, Afzal’s frame hung from the gallows. “He was dead in a minute, though”, as per the jail norms, the body was kept hanging for a full half hour, said an official who witnessed the hanging. Thereafter Afzal’s body was...
More »A perfect day for democracy-Arundhati Roy
-The Hindu Wasn’t it? Yesterday I mean. Spring announced itself in Delhi. The sun was out, and the Law took its Course. Just before breakfast, Afzal Guru, prime accused in the 2001 Parliament Attack was secretly hanged, and his body was interred in Tihar Jail. Was he buried next to Maqbool Butt? (The other Kashmiri who was hanged in Tihar in 1984. Kashmiris will mark that anniversary tomorrow.) Afzal’s wife and...
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