I have told my children their father has gone to perform Haj, says Yahiya Kammukutty’s wife Farida
Farida should have been happy—she is eight months pregnant, expecting her fourth baby. But with her husband Yahiya Khan alias Yahiya Kammukutty in Belgaum Central Jail, she has little to look forward to. A software professional who worked with companies in Bangalore, Yahiya was arrested in February on charges of plotting terror.
“The doctor has asked me to be cheerful, but how can I,” asks Farida, in her late 20s, hugging her three children, all less than 10 years old. A native of Karuvampoyil in North Kerala’s Kozhikode district, Farida said police had whisked Yahiya away from their Bangalore house on the pretext of address verification. She waited for a day, expecting he would return. It was at a restaurant that Farida and her family—her father Imbichiali and brother Nissam—saw TV visuals of Yahiya being taken to court. Farida collapsed in the eatery. “Our priority was to bring Farida to Kerala,” says Nissam.
When she returned to her husband’s house at Mukkom in Kozhikode, the media and the Kerala Police awaited her. Hindu outfits organised a march to the house of Yahiya, dubbing him a terrorist and anti-national. “The Karnataka Police have collected Malayalam literature on Muslim politics and a computer hard disk, but I still do not know what crime my husband committed,” says Farida. “I have told my children that their father has gone for Haj. What else can I tell them,” she asks.
_SHAJU PHILIP

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