They held a gun to his head; forced me to sign on blank paper: Techie Afzal’s wife

Bengaluru, Jan 23: Bushra Tabassum, whose techie husband Mohammed Afzal was among those arrested by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) during nationwide raids in the early hours of Friday, said the raiding team held a gun to her innocent husband's head and also forced her to sign on a blank sheet of paper.

It was 3 am when Bushra heard a loud knock at the apartment she lives in with her husband. The men who entered, she said, proclaimed they were from the Delhi Police, but offered no proof of identity. Bushra said that the men pointed a gun at her before taking Afzal away, handcuffed, for alleged links to ISIS.

"They showed me no identity, no papers at all, no search warrant, no arrest warrant. On what basis they are taking my husband? Nothing was disclosed to us," she said, describing her husband as "very, very innocent," said Bushra, who works from home as an HR consultant.

"I really don't know," she said when asked about when she expects to see her husband. Their four-year-old daughter kept near her as hijab-clad and teary-eyed Bushra spoke media persons.

“They knocked on the door and my husband opened it. As soon as they entered my house, they handcuffed him and asked me to sit in the room quietly. They pounced on him how dogs pounce on a person. The policemen then put a gun to my husband head, manhandled him and told him to show where the weapons were hidden. Then they ransacked the entire house, but could not find any weapon. My husband is a software engineer and a law abiding citizen. He has never been involved in any anti-social activity in his entire life,’’ she said.

Describing it as a very frightening experience especially for her three-year-old child, Bushra said the police seized her phone and laptop for no reason. “They have taken away the car and the bike which belongs to my husband. I am afraid that they will plant evidence against my husband and frame him,’’ Bushra said.

She added that they asked her to sign on a blank paper after they did not find any evidence of weapons. “I refused and told them to give me a written statement saying that they searched my house. The policemen later made me sign a letter which stated that they did not destroy my property. The paper was suspiciously blank and they purposely made me sign it. My husband is known to the Madrassa teacher, Syed Anzar Shah Khasmi and it appear that on the basis of that connection he has been framed in this case,’’ she said.

35-year-old Afzal is a project manager at IHS, a multi-national company in Whitefield. He was living with his wife and daughter in Saraipalya near Hegde Nagar off Nagawara junction in Bengaluru North. A diploma-holder, Afzal had worked with a couple of small companies. He took up a job in Saudi Arabia around eight years ago but returned after a few months when his father fell ill. He married Bushra in 2009.