Afzal Guru: A commission agent in fruits business

Afzal Guru was a graduate in political science from the Delhi University and was working as a commission agent when he was arrested for the Parliament attack case in 2001.

Guru, a resident of Sopore in north Kashmir, was the son of Habibullah Guru who ran a transport and timber business. The father died when Guru was very young.

In a secretly carried out operation, Guru was executed at 8 am today and buried in the Tihar prison premises.

Guru had also enrolled himself in the Jhelum Valley Medical College in 1988 for his MBBS course but could not complete it.

In Delhi, Guru stayed with his cousin Shaukat Guru, who was married to Afshan Navjyot, a Sikh girl who had converted to Islam.

43-year-old Guru's last recorded profession was to have been working as an agent in the fruits business when he was arrested by the police in Kashmir shortly after the December 13, 2001 attack on Parliament.

His wife Tabassum, who had appealed to the then President A P J Abdul Kalam for mercy for her husband, now lives in the Valley with their only son Ghalib.

Guru also joined the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) for some time.

People who know Afzal say he was always good in academics and took equal interest in extra-curricular activities.

The Supreme Court while upholding Guru's death sentence had termed the attack on Parliament in 2001 as an unparalleled assault on the supreme seat of democracy.

In its 271-page judgement delivered on August four, 2005, a Division Bench of Justices P V Reddi and P P Naolekar had said there was clinching evidence against Guru regarding his nexus with the terrorists who carried out the "terrorist act of most diabolical nature".

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