The girl who identified Qasab
Anniversaries are also a time to find out how life has moved on for people affected by the tragedy. And whether their lives have changed - for better or for worse - after the cruel twist of fate.
So, on the eve of the second anniversary of 26/11, I go looking for Devika Rotawan, who was shot in the leg by Mohammad Ajmal Amir Qasab, the only surviving gunman of the audacious attacks. She turned out to be a in the courts. (The by a special court earlier this year.) When I met her last November in her wretched one-room home in a bustling slum, the frail, smiling girl walked a slight limp, and told me she wanted to become a policewoman when she grew up. Her brother Jayesh lay sick in a corner with a debilitating bone disease, and her father Natwarlal, who had no work, worried about the future. The family had few possessions, and much of the compensation money - more than 200,000 rupees - had been spent on Jayesh's treatment.
Devika's fleeting fame - The girl who identified Qasab - keeps the family running. Her home is still basic with the pale yellow whitewash peeling off the walls, the dirty mattress, a few possessions - plastic chairs, a trunk, utensils. A TV set and a DVD player are the shiny new additions - both gifted by a prominent local politician who feted her at a reception earlier this year. A photograph of her mother Sarika, who died in 2006, has also found a place on the walls crowded with 26/11 drawings and calendars. And yes, Devika, who turns 12 next month, has begun going to a school for the first time in her life.
It wasn't easy, says Natwarlal. "It took months of persuasion. The school wanted proof that she was a 26/11 victim. The principal said admitting her would be a security risk, and the school could become a terrorist target. Can you believe it?" The school relented, he says, after media and public pressure. Does she like her school? I ask. Devika, immersed in her homework in a prim grey-and-white uniform, says: "I love it. But some of my classmates keep teasing me. They call me Qasab. Others heckle me as the girl who identified Qasab." Fame and infamy can sometimes go hand in hand.
Natwarlal, who once sold dry fruits for a living, still has no work. He tells me that he is scared to go out much as he gets a lot of threatening calls because of his daughter. "I get them at all hours," he tells me. "They call from all over the country. They say they will cut me into pieces because my daughter testified against Qasab." I ask him why he hasn't reported this to the police. "I have been to the police station. They tell me 'You are a tiger. Nobody can do anything to you'." Then why don't you change your number? I ask. He looks incredulously at me. "How can I change my number? The whole world knows this number. Obama knows this number!"
Natwarlal looks calm and relaxed as he talks about the telephone calls. Is he exaggerating and making up these stories? Why? Is this the only way, he feels, he can extract more out of the government in his daughter's name? He grumbles that the authorities still haven't given him a home that they promised. He says he has received more than 100,000 rupees over the past year from politicians and organisations for his daughter's bravery, but most of it has gone in treating his sick son. The family appears to be living off Devika's feat.
It is time to leave. I turn to Devika and ask whether she is happy. She looks up from her books, flashes a disarming smile and says: "I am happy and I am unhappy. I am unhappy because Qasab hasn't been hung yet. I am happy because I look forward to becoming a crime branch police officer when I grow up." It sounds disconcertingly scripted. Soon, we are standing outside in the sticky Mumbai afternoon. "Tomorrow is going to be a busy day," says Natwarlal. "So many news channels are going to visit us. I have to be at home for the interviews."
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