WELL KNOWN CRUCIFIXION IN LAHORE FORT IN BHUTTO’S PERIOD
JOURNALIST YUNUS PINNED TO A WOOD BOARD BY HALAKU KHAN

In the course of many decades we have seen bizarre visitors to our premises. We are told of the flogging of journalists in the times of General Zia ul Haque, but little is taken up of the atrocities in the period of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. A journalist who said he was thirty years old but looked to be sixty years old, walked in our premises, that is after 1977. Probably 1978 or 1979. He introduced himself and talked with us for hours. In fact he did not make one visit but called a few times and was reluctant to tell me his miseries in the start of our discussion. And then one day when he felt he had my confidence, he narrated a strange tale to me.

Roughly his story was like this. Muhammed Yunus used to write in the Urdu press and his expose was the Governmental regime. He openly wrote against the policies of Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. This was resented in certain quarters and he was warned to desist from the same. He did not listen and one day he was picked up by the governmental people, that is civilian in power. He was taken to the Lahore Fort. The dungeons which were historically known to house political prisoners. It was famous that the same prison was governed by a police officer who was known as Halaku Khan for his cruelties. He had the knack of torturing people and enjoyed doing same. Yunus was tortured for days and the ultimate torture was that he was stripped naked and pinned on a wooden board with iron nails. Perhaps his awe and prayers were heard by the Al-Mighty, for the regime underwent a change and Yunus was saved from death by a miracle.

Yunus looked at me and said that you are looking at me with disbelief and I want to prove same to you. He raised the sleeves of the shirt as well as his shalwar. There were deep gaping holes in the arms as ell as the legs, and no surgery could have removed the torture signs on him. I could imagine the same wounds, full of blood and was literally vomiting at even the thoughts of same. People in power do strange things. Freedom of speech can bring disastrous results. But then the Quranic Law of Makufat has its own way of doing things. I am sure Yunus is out there somewhere and doing what is unknown today.