Let Govt say I am no terrorist: Roshan, from Madrid cell

In his first interaction with the media since he was arrested on January 19, the Mumbai-resident told The Indian Express by phone from jail in Madrid that he was innocent but did not have a clue about what was happening to his case.

“I want them to check my family’s record going back two or three generations,” Khan said. “I believe that the CBI and Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad have already cleared me but I want my Government to tell them that I am not a terrorist.”

“I have no clue what is happening,” said the St. Xavier College graduate, who started the conversation in Hindi and then switched to fluent English. “Ten days ago, I spoke to an Indian official. I have no idea where the case is going. I have been produced in court only once at the beginning and since then there has been no word on my case. I hope that I will be produced in court soon. But I really do not know where to go from here.”

Khan’s family has urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the External Affairs Ministry and the Spanish Consulate-General to intervene saying he is innocent and immigrant groups have staged protests in Spain seeking his freedom. Last month, Minister of State for External Affairs, Anand Sharma, told the Lok Sabha that the government had asked Spanish authorities to communicate what formal charges had been made against Khan.

Khan is allowed to call his family eight times a week for four minutes each and his wife Farida and their four sons and two daughters wait anxiously almost every evening at their Jogeshwari West home in Mumbai, hoping he will call. Every time the phone rings in the evening, the children rush to the room where the landline is kept, hoping it is their father, only to return disappointed most times.

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