Fifteen days of horror

By Maqbool Sahil
Once I was inside my cell, I wondered aloud: Where am I? A voice filtering through the slit in the steel door told me that I was in the Hariniwas interrogation chamber in Kashmir. I was picked up on September 16, 2006, by the Counter Insurgency Kashmir [a special wing of J&K Police that deals with terrorism-related cases] which accused me of spying for Pakistan. My family was not informed about my arrest.
When the interrogation started, I was least prepared for the ordeal. They bombarded me with questions: Who else is working with you for Pakistan? To whom are you sending pictures from Kashmir [he is a photo-journalist]? When they did not get the answers they wanted, the torture intensified. I was subjected to sleep deprivation and was denied food for the first three days. I was kicked and beaten with a rubber baton. They then chained my hands and left me hanging from the top of a door. They told me in no uncertain terms that unless I confessed that I was spying for Pakistan, I would not see my family again. I cried often. Sometimes I thought I would die in that dark torture cell and no one would ever know about it.
On the fifth day, my feet were manacled and I was ruthlessly beaten up. I then heard somebody outside say, “Don't worry, I will make him speak.” I peered through the slit in the door and found that it was Senior Superintendent of Police Ashkhoor Wani, who headed the CIK. As a journalist I knew him for years. He was notorious but I had never imagined that one day I would become his prey.
The torture started afresh. My hands were tied behind with a rope, one end of which was rolled over a metal pipe fixed to the ceiling. They pulled the rope and I was hanging in mid-air. It was very painful. I felt as if my brain was going to burst. Every time I was subjected to this torture, I collapsed and lost consciousness. The torture would then stop, only to restart when I regained consciousness. When they tired of it, they stretched my legs wide and the balls of the joints were displaced. I could not walk properly for six months after that.
There were over 30 people detained there. I didn't know where they were from. But they all were terrified and silent. After 15 days, the CIK prepared a dossier on me and I was detained under the Public Safety Act for over three years. I was released in January after the police failed to press charges against me in court.
The detention facility has since been shifted to Humhama area in Budgam district.
As told to Syed Nazakat