October 23, 2006	Monday	Ramazan 29, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, Oct 22: The saying “Only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches” seems to have been coined for the family members of hundreds of people missing for years after allegedly being picked up by secret agencies.

One such victim is Ayesha, 9. About one-and-a-half years ago, her father was ‘picked up’, while he was on his way to Peshawar from Rawalpindi. No body knows as to his whereabouts or the charges against him.

Little Ayesha says she always had meal with her father. “I would wait for him till late hours and, many a time, sleep without having dinner if Baba did not come, but never took food alone. He would bring toys for me.” She had also told her friends that Baba would bring more toys. But it happened the other way round. Her father did not return, let alone bring her toys. She and her mother searched for him a lot, but to no avail.

Such is the ordeal of the families of hundreds of people picked up by the agencies on suspicion of having been associated with the Taliban or Al-Qaeda. Their families, relatives and friends have been going from pillar to post, holding protests, trying to approach the high-ups and even the courts, but sans any success so far.

“Without them, we are like corpses. This world has become a hell for us. Is there any place where we can go to get justice from?” said Ms Masood, sobbing and weeping.

She says her children always ask about their father. They ask why he was kidnapped. Who kidnapped him? “I have no answers. Since his disappearance, we have not seen a happy day. This uncertain situation has developed psychological problems in our children.” This shows that not only the future of the parents is at stake, but the coming generations are set to face the worst.

Typical of her age, little Ayesha has been asking questions whether her father would have taken the meals, or if he were thirsty, or whether he is allowed to sleep? She fears her father might be beaten by the people who kidnapped him. “Whenever I ask someone about father they tell me he was abducted by the agencies. What are these agencies after all? Whether they are human beings? Whether they have hearts? If they are human then they don’t have daughters like me?

The trauma of having lost a loved one and not knowing whether they are alive or not is something specific to the affected families, but what everyone can recognise is the unprecedented excess of the highest degree.

It also raises the question whether the secret agencies are for the security of the country or terrorising, harassing and kidnapping its citizens. If they have any charges against them, the judiciary is there to try them.

But detaining them for years without any allegation and without telling the family members why and where they have been kept is outrightly inhuman.

As the biggest annual festival of the Muslims, Eidul Fitr, is just round the corner, will the agencies or anyone else have a little pity on the hapless families and arrange their meetings with the missing people?