(Trigger Warning: Graphic details of torture in this piece).
In July 2025, the Bombay High Court acquitted all 12 individuals who were convicted in the 7/11 train blasts, after setting aside the 2015 Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) court order. As one of those acquitted, I interviewed Naveed Hussain Khan who was also exonerated after spending 19 years behind bars like me in this case.
You can also watch my interview with The Quint here.
These individuals spent 19 years, a duration wherein which many alleged torture and harassment. A duration which changed their lives irrevocably forever.
Khan was based in Hyderabad. On the day of the blast too, he was in Hyderabad. He has also stayed at Mira Road, and he was around 26 years old when he was arrested and then jailed, subsequently. In jail, Khan learnt Arabic and also did his graduation in Marathi from Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University. This is the first time Khan agreed to sit down for an interview.
The day Bombay High court said to you — you appeared before the court via video conferencing — and the court said that we are acquitting everyone, how do you remember that moment?
It was an emotional moment. The first word that came out of my mouth was: Allah. Allah is the most merciful, and I also cried, because I told you I had thought I would be granted death penalty here again and I would have to approach the Supreme Court, and how wrong I was to think this, and then there is Allah who has helped me, so my faith got reinstated and I also repented because I was thinking negatively. Allah is all powerful and the almighty, so I had these mixed feelings, I felt happiness, sadness, repentance.
You were released after 19 years and you were kept at Phansi Yard for many years, so when you look back at it and remember those days, how do you feel about it today? Do you think of it as a nightmare? Do those memories still haunt you? Do you feel scared of the unknown?
See, I don’t feel scared of it, because when you have complete trust in God, and when you start trusting Allah, then there are two things — so you know that you have nothing to worry about, and the second is that I am not alone, Allah is with me. So you are not scared, because Allah has given you such guidance that you don’t get scared, if I tell you in the past 19 years, in the beginning, I was not aware of the faith, but when I read about it, and got informed, then my fears went away. Today, I feel that we went to a hostel to study, and we learnt a lot upon our acquittal.
You mentioned that you have learnt a lot in the jail, so please tell us what languages you have learnt, which books did you read?
The first thing I learnt was to read and write Urdu because I did not know Urdu, and thanks to Allah, I found many people who were learned scholars, who were calligraphers, who were scholars of Urdu, and they taught me, and I learnt to write three fonts in calligraphy, and I learnt Urdu, and after that I also learnt Arabic to understand what is written in the Quran because a lot of people used to tell me that me that I cannot understand it and whom I should listen to, instead, I decided to not depend on anyone else and that I should learn and understand it myself. So, I learnt Arabic, and now I can understand Quran thanks to my knowledge of Arabic. I knew English, and just to challenge myself I also learnt Marathi, and I also completed my graduation in Marathi.
So what is the system of studying in the jail, whether it is from IGNOU or Yashwantrao University, is it easy and accessible or are there barriers to learning, do you have to struggle a lot?
Studying in jail is not encouraged, because they have a fixed attitude (towards the prisoners ) that these people cannot be redeemed, so what is the point of encouraging them to study? But we had a few inmates who sent applications to IGNOU Indira Gandhi National Open University, asking them to open a centre there, so they opened one in the jail and a lot of people enrolled themselves and benefited from it, so these things should be there, but sadly it is not the case, and you have to struggle if you want to study, you have to take an order from the court so that you can be allowed to venture outside to sit for the exam. If you are dedicated, you can study, but if you lack motivation, then you won’t be able to.
Because these 12 prisoners were caught from different parts of India and arrested. So, what were you accused of, and what was your defence?
In the beginning when they caught me, it was on the basis of a phone number. One of the accused had my number in his contact, and he had contacted me a few times at night, so they had no idea what to do with me. Before I was caught, the commissioner of police knew where to put me, so in the press conference — whereas I had not even reached the court — they had already declared my offence, my role.
And this was announced without your interrogation being done?
No, they had already announced it, and based on that, I was interrogated. I was informed that this was my role and I had to consent to that, and to make me confess, they beat me up, and they took my signature on the confession. They call it a confession but they write their own story and only your signature is taken. To get this, they threaten to implicate your mother, father, brother, sister in the case, and no one can tolerate these threats, they can tolerate beatings. They torture you so much that your feet swell, they hit you on your palms, your legs are separated forcibly, and for a week you urinate blood, so a person can tolerate this torture, but when it comes to your family members, the person thinks why should my family suffer? if they have decided to implicate me in this case, then I should suffer, and protect my family, so these things break a person.
So, you were accused of planting the bomb in the train, the bomb went off and so many people died, so if we talk about defense, what was your defense?
My defense was my call records — I used a post-paid phone, and the tower location showed that I was never at that place where the conspiracy was hatched or where the bombs were planted, whatever allegations they had placed on me.
Where is that location? Where are the CDRs? (Call Detail Records)
They did not allow us to procure that CDR for 8 years, and whenever we applied in the court asking for CDR and location, then the public prosecutor said because we are not relying on this document, we won’t give it to you, and sometimes they said those documents are destroyed and we are unable to locate them, so they kept making different excuses to stall the process and we were kept away from the CDR, and finally after 8 years the Mumbai High court mentioned that those should be taken out, so at that time they devised a scheme to make it so expensive that it remains out of reach for us, so the Nodal Officer was called and he said we can retrieve this information for you but one copy would cost you 60 lakh rupees. So how can we arrange this huge amount? Then the judge at the Session Court said that it should be produced free of cost, but I don’t know what became of the data or what process they used to retrieve it, that none of the information there was complete, but one thing was out that they could not place us at the scene of crime.
You said that whatever accusation was placed on you — the accusation of planting a bomb because of which so many people died and so many were injured, and you also mentioned that your confession was ready and they tortured you just to get your signature on it, so that torture, I feel that you were kept in police custody for almost 30 days. And you were tortured for 30 days, so how were you tortured?
Yes. See there is a belt, a belt is used to push a chakki, it is placed on a wooden plank by hitting nails on it, and that belt has a message engraved on it something like meri awaaz suno (listen to me), aap aaye bahaar aayi (As soon as you came, spring arrived ), main sach bolunga (I will speak the truth).
What is the reason behind it? Why are such messages engraved?
So that people are scared of it — Aap aaye bahar aayi would mean that this plank has been taken out just to welcome you, and main sach bolunga means that I will speak the truth after getting beaten up, and we are beaten up on our soles and palms with that. One constable is standing behind you and your hands are tied behind, and your legs are stretched towards the front so that your soles are exposed, and one person sits on your knees so that they stay in place and you are unable to move them, and one person hits your soles with the plank. Sometimes they count, sometimes they don’t, and you are beaten up until you pass out and after you gain consciousness, you are asked to walk on a rope that is tied in knots or you will be asked to jump down from a place, so that both your feet land on the ground, your feet used to turn blue, and there was no sensation in your feet.
And to reduce the swelling a little? Was there anything else said?
Yes, and for the swelling in your hands we were given paper balls to make, and we were not allowed to sleep, and there is a channel gate with a railing above, and your handcuffed to that railing, so you can neither rest nor sit, and you cannot sleep standing, so the entire night you are on your feet, and the rope is kept under you so that you keep stepping on it, other than that, they abuse you verbally, and whosoever came asked a question, and the question was such that I used to wonder is this why you have brought me here, like someone used to say — when Pakistan wins (a cricket match), you burst crackers. So I said I don’t even watch cricket, I have no interest in the game, and is this why you have brought me here, because I burst crackers?
This shows the sincerity of the investigation agency, how insincere they are, you arrested someone in one case, and you placed such serious allegations on them, and now you are asking them foolish questions, and since we were discussing tortures, you mentioned them torturing you with planks, so this is one step.…next?
Second is there is a wooden table that has tyres, and you are made to lie on it, and a towel is placed on your face and water is poured on you from a jug, and a monitor is attached to check the blood pressure so that it can be figured out if you are not losing consciousness, so your breath stops and you are unable to breathe, and you feel as if your drowning, because there is water on your face and mouth, and you are unable to breathe, and you are in agony, and this torture goes on for hours, and it is called waterboarding. After that a Sodium pentothal injection is administered, and after that your ears are pulled using tweezers and they hit you on your head with hands, and this is illegal Narco analysis.
You were talking about waterboarding as a form of torture, what else?
After that, after waterboarding they took you inside to beat you up. There is one room which is called soundproof room so that your screams don’t travel outside, so you are taken there and stripped naked, and there 5-6 people beat you up with sticks and planks, and these are the forms of torture — morning, afternoon, evening, night — 4 times we are beaten up.
And you were tortured for 30 days, was there any other way you were tortured?
See there is a belt, a belt is used to push a chakki, it is placed on a wooden plank by hitting nails on it, and that belt has a message engraved on it something like meri awaaz suno (listen to me), aap aaye bahaar aayi (As soon as you came, spring arrived ), main sach bolunga (I will speak the truth)
My next question is that the ATS tried its best to turn you into an approver, you were tempted, threatened, so what did you have to go through, and why were you chosen as an approver, why were you in focus?
See, out of the thirteen people, so we were chalk and cheese, so out of one is to twelve ratio. I mean I was not associated with them, I was not a part of any organisation or any group, I meant that I did not fit anywhere, and I had no connection with anyone, so the officer used to tell me - why are you trying to protect these donkeys - they used to use such words - and I used to think whom am I protecting? I can’t even protect myself.
You read books even inside Phansi yard, you translated the shayari of Aamir Usmani, you evolved as per changing times, how did you get the inspiration?
See you challenge yourself to check if I can do this and if something has been written in Urdu, can you translate it into English, and if you can translate it in such a way that it is not lost in translation and people can actually make out what has been said, because many things are not present in other language, and many people do not read Urdu, so that it does not get lost because it is precious, and they have not reached many people because of the language, and since you have not studied that language you do not understand what you have missed and when you read it you know that there is a different perspective to look at the world, so it was challenging for me because I was not sure if I can do justice to it, so I wrote it, and I tried my best that the translation stayed true to the essence, and that it can be understood what has been written actually. I did a lot of translation work, and you did not know how your time passed when you are translating, you are working, you are enjoying your work and you are also gaining experience, so this is how I worked as a translator.
In a period of 19 years, you lost many relatives around you, you lost your father but you did not get the opportunity to go to his funeral, and you were unable to see him for the last time, and you still miss your father, so how will you describe that grief?
You cannot express it in words, and everyone is attached to their relatives differently, I won’t love my father the way you love yours and vice versa, so there is no parameter set that you can measure how much you loved him and what I could have done and whatnot but you are surrounded by troubles and you know that you would have to deal with them while you are alive and when you die your troubles end.
You are acquitted now, so what are your goals now, what do you want to know, what are you thinking?
Self-dependency, self employment, I have come out after so many years and I am not in the age to enter employment, and even if I think that I should get a job no one would hire me because I have been branded as an accused, it is a case of terrorism that carries a stigma with itself, so even if you have been acquitted by the High Court and you can restart your life and rehabilitate yourself, and reform, but the society is scared of you, but because they have something to lose — respect, name, money - so everyone is scared of losing it so they don’t want to rehabilitate you.