Journalist turned author S Hussain Zaidi discusses his life’s journey and his new book in a free-wheeling chat with Saimi Sattar

S Hussain Zaidi has had a chequered life. He had no intentions of being a journalist, leave alone a writer of comprehensive books detailing the underworld and terrorist networks. But then life has a way of taking you to your manifest destiny. Out with his eighth book, Dangerous Minds, which incidentally carries eight riveting profiles of homegrown terrorists, Zaidi, has now accepted that writing books is his bread and butter.

Zaidi was born in Vikhroli, a lower middle class locality in Mumbai. Both his parents were born in lucknow and had settled in Mumbai. His father was a tailor. It was his mother who defying family norms decided to enroll Zaidi and his younger sister into an English medium school to the consternation of his grandparents.

He says, “I became a journalist by accident. I did my PG in management studies and I set up a business where I was exporting things to Dubai.” By 1992, he had to fold up his business as the dollar had been devalued due to liberalisation, and he had incurred major losses. In 1993, he was working at a magazine called Exhibition World, when the infamous Bombay bomb blasts of 1993 occurred.

During the investigation that followed, a lot of people were rounded up on suspicion of collaborating with the bombers. And it was here that he took his first tentative step into  investigative journalism. He says, “I did a story as a free-lancer for Blitz where I talked about fourth-degree torture that was being inflicted on the bomb accused. The police caught hold of the women — wives, daughters, sisters of those rounded up and threatened to disrobe or rape them in front of those men who refused to confess.” This was being done as under the TADA (Terrorists and Disruptive Activities Prevention Act) even a confessional statement could be taken as a proof against the accused.

Sudheendra Kulkarni, currently the head of the Observer Research Foundation, was the editor of Blitz and he had promised to pay him Rs 600. But on seeing the exhaustive research that Zaidi had put in, ended up paying him double the amount, a sum of  Rs 1,200. The article was published in 1994 in the Blitz, which was not a big platform. “I wanted a greater impact. So I tried to reach out to more established reporter. There was a journalist in Bombay Times who was doing exposes of policemen and politician and I decided to give ‘him’ the story,” recalls Zaidi. When they met, it was Zaidi’s turn to be surprised as the reporter, Velly Thevar turned out to be a woman. “She promised to publish the story and and the discussions carried on for six weeks. By the end of which we got married,” he says.

On August 1, 1995, Zaidi went on to join the profession full-time and worked with The Asian Age (of which he later became the resident editor), The Indian Express, Mid Day and Mumbai Mirror. And there were several career highs for him, not least of them an interview with Dawood Ibrahim himself in 1997. Zaidi has spoken about how he got a message on his pager saying that he should call a local number while travelling in an auto. He hopped out and called, only to be connected with the elusive don.

1997 was an eventful year for the journalist-turned-writer. Vikram Chandra was writing Sacred Games and he wanted the help of someone who knew the underworld in and out. “In an year’s time I gave him a lot of information on the underworld. And Vikram said that since I had so much knowledge, I should write a book,” says Zaidi.  Chandra set up a meeting with David Davidar, the Penguin editor and publisher at Mumbai’s Oberoi. “It was four years since the Bombay (now Mumbai) blasts had taken place and there were a lot of documents available now,” he says. Zaidi sees Davidar commissioning a book when the former could still be considered a greenhorn in journalism as another high point of his career.

What made Black Friday exceptional was the amount of research that went into it and the miniscule details that he mentioned. The book found an instant connect and became a best seller. It was also made into a controversial movie with the same name.

But initially Zaidi had no clue to the amount of work that would go into Black Friday. There were 10,000 pages of statements, evidence, FIRs and other related documents. “I had thought it would be a cakewalk and it would get over in three months. It took me four years,” says Zaidi, who was working at the Indian Express when he started the book.

But work doesn’t get over once he has finished the research, writing it too takes time. “One day I wrote non-stop for nine hours, but at the end of the day had only 500 words to show for it because I had erased or changed a lot,” he says.

So Dongri to Dubai took seven years to write and Black Friday took four. “The amount of time that a book takes, depends on the subject as the amount of documents varies with each,” he says.

For all the books that followed, Zaidi continued to depend on meticulous research and include details that make them come alive for the reader. “I lose track of time. I forget dinner and even my children when I am in the thick of research. Once I was on the road for two days, and had nothing more than a cup of tea,” he says.

Thanks to the work that he puts in, Sanjay Gupta decided to use the information to film, Shootout at Wadala. Zaidi is also associate producer of the HBO documentary, Terror in Mumbai, which is based on the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai.

Through his book Zaidi has tried to understand the genesis of CAs, engineers into something frightening and their taking terrorism. The idea of his latest book is based on the premise of people who have a ‘dangerous mind’, who fight and kill in the name of Islam. “I decided to showcase that they come from diverse classes and disparate groups. That is the reason I took up eight different people who were not restricted to one class,” he says.

But writing about dons, terrorists and at the same time highlighting the excesses of the police can have a fallout. “Around 2002-3, I got a phone call which chilled my spine. The person at the other end told me that they knew that my son studied in a particular class in a school.” While Zaidi felt the unfairness of involving and exposing a six-year old, his reply gave the impression that he was unfazed. “I told the caller, his  name is Ali and he studies at Saraswati Vidyalaya. The caller must have thought that I am beyond salvage and a little crazy and he disconnected the phone,” he says.

Another brush with danger was when he went to Iraq after Saddam Hussain had been toppled by the US forces and he wanted to interview people close to the former dictator. Zaidi was kidnapped in Baghdad and when the abductor realised that he was an Indian, he was released on the promise that Zaidi would help him meet Amitabh Bachchan if he was ever in Mumbai!

Despite, the risks involved, Zaidi realises that people are not excited by non-fiction. “They think writing fiction is more creative and liberating,” he says. 

But, he continues to soldier on.