Author: Noroz Hayat

This story is about an ‘unjust’ trial of a dissident of an oppressed nation by a corrupt judiciary system. Such secret and unfair prosecutions of Baluch people are very common in Baluchistan. They are denied access to defense lawyers and given no right to defend themselves,  correspondingly their right to appeal is violated by the establishment backed judiciary.

“Why don’t you understand? Are you humans or animals? Ghosts, witches or what are you? Are you humans of this modern age?With your values, culture, education and enlightenment, is this what you do? Even animals feel ashamed of doing such deeds. You have crossed all the limits of humanity. You know that, right? You are certainly not not like any other people in this world. If you still insist on calling yourself decent human beings, then let me tell you that you are just like those people whose history has been written in dark and condemnable words. In the same way that they have been held accountable for their evil deeds, so you will be held accountable, and in the same way your history will be written in dark words. The castle of your dominion will also be destroyed one day because fortune’s wheel is ever turning. Every sunrise has a sunset.”

He was speaking very softly, uttering his words one by one so that all of them could be well understood by the people present at the trial. When he was done speaking, he puzzled over his situation: “If they had any regard for human rights, they wouldn’t have tortured me here like this. Well, they haven’t tortured me physically but I cannot stand this kind of senseless questioning. I cannot bear their interrogation any longer.”

“I have always stood by the credence that I am a free soul, and for as long as I am alive I will never allow anyone to violate my freedom and question my right to live my own life. That too for no reason.”

After thinking for a long time, he couldn’t bear it any longer and started speaking again, but this time his voice was louder. With wisdom and maturity, he presented his case to the corrupt jury.

Nobody would believe he was a 21-year-old boy. Judging by his words he seemed like someone who had seen all the ups and downs of life. He sounded like a sixty- or a seventy-year-old man from his powerful and wise words.

“We will not be silenced by coercion, by enforced separation from our people and displacements from our lands or or by depriving us of food and water. r. We will not be scared by the prospect of being fettered and put in cages like animals. We have grown into a bond with each other through the sweet melodies of love, peace, struggle and unity. We will spread like rose fragrance, like cool and soft sir of the night and morning breeze of our lands.”

The jury was amazed by the young man’s words and his way of thinking. His non-conformist thoughts could roughly be translated as: “It is inevitable to encounter darkness on the long road to peace, but one should remember that there is light at the end of the dark road.”

The jurors of the court looked at each other but this time they didn’t say anything. They didn’t even utter a single word. It seemed as if they were asking themselves: “So, that’s how it is? Won’t these people stop existing, won’t their identities get lost, won’t they be eliminated through poverty, misery and looting? Why won’t they stop dreaming of flying, like caged birds do?”

There was a pin drop silence in the court. They opened his handcuffs. A moment later he removed his blindfold himself. He raised his eyes and lifted them up and saw that he had been brought into a dark room. There was a large table in front of him. Five people were sitting at the table, in front of him, and five others were standing behind them. Another man was pacing back and forth in the room.

He did not look back but at the same moment a man cleared his throat from behind and he realized that there was another person standing behind his back. So, there were total twelve other people present in the room, all in all.

Now the investigation process had ended. He saw that there was nothing on the table. His eyes had been blinded during the first part of the trial, so all this time he could only hear the sounds of papers rustling and pens writing. He knew that they had all his details: all information about him: where he had studied, what he had studied, where he had traveled for work and earned his living, what places he had visited to ask the poor about their hardships.

The trial was about to end. It was the first trial that didn’t take much of the corrupt jury’s time. He himself had answered everything before the jury had a chance to bring their senseless queries to an end. Before the end of the trial, he finished his statement with the following poem:

“Listen

The more you suppress us

The more we resist

We will spread like rose fragrance

Everywhere on our land”