Nissar Shaikh was one of six innocents who died because of the Hari Masjid police firing on January 10, 1993. His friends keep his memory alive with a trophy named after him
Nissar Shaikh was one of six innocents who died because of the Hari Masjid police firing on January 10, 1993. His friends keep his memory alive with a trophy named after him
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IT'S not everyday that a Hindu festival commemorates the memory of a Muslim. For this to happen in the Marathi heartland of Parel is even rarer. But for three years after his death in police firing, the Fitwala Lane annual Govinda trophy was named after 24-year-old Nissar Shaikh, who lived on that lane.
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Nissar Shaikh, who was shot in the spine at Hari Masjid |
But this wasn't any ordinary Sunday. It was January 10, 1993. And the masjid Nissar stopped at wasn't any ordinary masjid. It was the Hari Masjid situated between Wadala and Sewree the site where, according to the Srikrishna Commission Report on the 1992-93 riots, six innocent people were shot dead by then Sub-Inspector Nikhil Kapse, four of them inside the masjid.
Nissar's family later found the ITI fees, a blood-stained wad of 5,000-rupee notes, in the masjid, where Nissar was shot in the spine. Unlike others shot there, Nissar didn't die immediately. This sporty youth, who loved the gym, football and swimming he often swam at the Kamgar Stadium near his home lingered on in hospital as a paraplegic, till meningitis claimed him six months later. By then, he had told his five sisters and parents the name of the man who had shot him.u00a0
Last month, Nikhil Kapse, now Senior Inspector, was charged by the CBI u/secs 302 (murder) and 307 (attempt to murder) for the firing at Hari Masjid. As soon as they heard the news, Nissar's sisters brought out the records of his death, hoping the CBI will record their statement. "We didn't know a man named Nikhil Kapse existed till our brother told us his name; now, we are ready to go to court whenever called to see that he is punished.
Thanks to Kapse, we learnt the ways of the world very quickly," says a bitter Rashida, Nissar's younger sister, who deposed before the Srikrishna Commission.
Getting Nissar's medical records and police documents from KEM Hospital and R A K Marg police station was no easy task. The family has guarded these documents, hoping they will help book the man they regard responsible for their brother's "unnecessary" death.
Nissar was the only son, and his untimely death had a deep impact on the Shaikh family. It drove the eldest of his five sisters into a depression she has yet to come out of. She was the first and only graduate in the family, the one who used to help him with his studies. Nissar's mother, who practically stayed with him in the hospital, never recovered from the tragedy, and remained ill till she died three years back. His father Ibrahim, who ran the family's small bread shop, was proud that his only son dreamt of a world beyond it. After Nissar's death, the shop became the family's only source of livelihood, but Ibrahim no longer had the heart to run it, and gave it out on rent.
Nikhil Kapse described the Hari Masjid firing as a response to Muslims running riot against Hindus a version Justice Srikrishna found "wholly unbelievable". After hearing of Nissar's death in the firing, some miscreants broke into the Shaikhs' shop, and made a bonfire of its contents on the road. "They said, 'Your boy went to Sewri to riot; this is our revenge,'" recounts Abida, his elder sister, adding, "Those people didn't know him.
Everyone who knew 'Ibu pavwala ka ladka' called him a 'dev manus'."
Those who did know him commemorated Nissar's memory differently. Anil Pednekar, Dattaram Wagwe, Rajesh Chavan, Ulhas Roderigues, Sanjay Bhajiwala, Vithal Ambodkar, Ajay Murudkar, Vijay Adjul, and many more, most of them true-blue Marathi-speaking Hindus, paid their tribute to their friend by naming the award for their most popular competition, the annual Govinda trophy, after him.
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