A self-styled sufi peer in the Valley has been picked up for deflowering virgins to “purify” their souls. The sex and sleaze racket, which was the mainstay of his “religious” institution, unfolded in a secret chamber in its basement. The Valley is in shock as his victims continue to flow into court with damning evidence against his sexual attacks. KHURSHEED WANI reports on the rise and rise of an illiterate carpenter to “sainthood” as he now claims he was always impotent
Until mid-May, four prominent newspapers in the Kashmir Valley repeatedly published an ad on the schedule of a ‘saint’ living in an obscure hamlet in Budgam district. In the quarter of an inch space, a picture of the ‘holy man’ in white attire with a flowing dark beard and an unusual headgear attracted much attention. Occasionally, on published fixtures, he would leave the village in a cavalcade, followed by his disciples, both men and women, to deliver sermons at various locations. His fan following was on a huge surge.
However, circumstances drastically changed for this uncrowned king of a kingdom he developed surreptitiously in the past 15 years. On May 22, following repeated summons from the police, this ‘godman’ surrendered in court and remanded to police custody. Cops say they have clinching evidence that this man misused religion to sexually exploit young village girls, mostly naïve and unmarried, on the pretext of ‘purifying’ them.
This 42-year-old sex predator goes by the name of Gulzar Ahmad Bhat, who mysteriously metamorphosed from a petty illiterate carpet weaver into a spiritual guru. He changed his surname and went by new appendages of Syed and Reshi, two highly revered lineages in Muslims. On May 28, when Hazrat Syed Gulzar Ahmad Reshi was presented in court for remand extension, he had lost his headgear and fallen from grace.
By the time this report was filed, nine girls had already deposed in court, narrating horrifying details about the sex maniac. The common thread in the statements is that Gulzar entranced them before they fell on their knees before him. He made them believe that sexual activity was a religious obligation to purify their bodies and souls. He would take a pledge in the name of God and His Prophet while holding each girl’s hand and asking them not to reveal the details of the incident to anyone.
He told them that he had received a divine commandment to marry 72 women.
A group of his trusted maids, known as madams, did the reassuring and congratulated the girls on losing their virginity. They made them believe that the sexual act, referred to as yeksaan (unification) in the cult, purified them and graduated their souls to spirituality. The girls were mostly enrolled in an unregistered residential institution, run in the premises of Gulzar’s ancestral home. The school, Idara-e-Noor-e-ain Syedatun Nissa Hazrat Fatimatuzzuhra, offered short-term religious courses based on a vague syllabus set by the illiterate Reshi and his sidekicks.
Gulzar’s sleazy secret began leaking in December 2012 when some girls questioned his sexual escapades. “Islam does not allow any woman to have a sexual relationship with a person who is not formally married to her. This man (Gulzar) is exploiting us”, a south Kashmir girl first told a batchmate. The girls could only whisper but had no courage to herald a rebellion because Reshi was a big man with a huge following and they were overawed by his influence over his entranced followers.
But the murmurs soon breached the confines of the dormitory compelling the shaken ‘saint’ and his aides to go in for damage control and silence the girls both through lure and intimidation.
The girls left the hostel and went to various religious and separatist leaders to expose Reshi. Only sympathy and assurances came their way, till, Maulvi Muhammad Amin, the Valley’s head of london-based International Khatam-e-Nabuwat Movement, decided to verify their claims.
Before stirring the hornet’s nest, he encouraged the girls to formally approach the Government through appropriate channels. Finally, these girls filed a complaint with the police and their medical examination confirmed that they had lost their virginity. The court issued warrants and cops went on a lookout.
“We have clinching evidence against this man”, Bashir Ahmad Dar, DSP, Khansahib, who is heading the Special Investigation Team, told Foray. The district police constituted the SIT after formally taking Reshi into custody. “We are only focusing on sexual exploitation. For now, we are not exploring the sources of his funding”, he said.
The police have seized a mattress from his secret chamber, which he referred to as hujra-e-khas or special room, where no man other than him had access. “It (mattress) is full with deep traces of dried seminal fluid”, Dar said. The police have recovered medicines, possibly aphrodisiacs, and several garments, from this secret room.
One garment, a pheran (long flowing cloak) is splashed with edible oil. Police said that a girl deposed that she once resisted Reshi and during the scuffle an oil container turned upside down on her pheran.
Reshi has hundreds of followers in the Valley. His male followers, known as talibs, grew long facial hair and mane hiding their necks and wore skullcaps and pherans. They don’t offer prayers in common mosques but gather on Fridays at Nendwenpora where they have built a huge mosque. Reshi used to deliver his weekly sermon in that mosque. In Malabagh locality of Srinagar, his talibs once attacked an Imam who dared to confront their religious beliefs as anti-Islamic. Most of these talibs have gone into hiding after the expose.
Reshi’s victims have told the police that he used to begin the sexual activity past 11 pm. Sometimes, it turned into an orgy with up to 11 girls in a larger room but usually, he used to sleep with one girl he chose for the night. “There was some kind of spell I went into whenever he called me into his room. I used to watch everything happening but could not resist”, one of the girls said. An audio clip of a victim narrating her tale has gone viral on the Internet.
Reshi used to tell the girls that they had been chosen by God to secretly marry him and that his touch would absolve their bodies from hell fire. “I am God’s chosen one. My body is noor (divine light) and whichever body part I touch, will not be affected by naar (fire)”, a metric dropout quoted him as saying.
During or after the crash course, Reshi’s confidants would secretly inform them that bab (a revered name given to family elders or mystics) wanted to meet them in his secret room, which was out of bounds for men. There, he made them take an oath of secrecy and convinced them that their union was sacred. He told them that they were not required to perform ghusul (full body ablution mandatory for Muslims under the Shariah), after intercourse.
Reshi, the victims narrated, would engage in sexual activity till 3 am and then take a nap till 6 am. From 9 am, he would go into seclusion and memorise Quranic verses and their meaning to prepare for sermons and interactions with disciples. Between 7 and 10 pm, he would watch television in the company of girls who would caress and fondle his legs, shoulders and arms. After 10 am, he used to play harmonium for an hour in his secret room or listen to sufi music on music system.
Police say, they have rounded up some of the madams who had been with him for a decade. “They are ready to depose in court but not willing to go through the medical test”, an officer revealed.
Reshi’s arrest and revelations have stunned the conservative society of the Valley. Some quarters, especially separatist circles, have suggested that his activities were funded by ‘unknown agencies’. They opined that without the background support, he would not have been able to raise huge buildings. Abdul Hameed Kumar, a diehard disciple of Reshi, told Foray that Rs72 lakh had been spent in raising the four-storey building adjacent to his ancestral mud-house and insisted that the money was collected through donations.
locals are flabbergasted over the phenomenal rise of a carpet-weaver. “We have seen many wealthy people coming in expensive cars to pay obeisance to him. He travels the length and breadth of the Valley”, sarpanch Mohiuddin Bhat said, adding that his victims were from the lower strata of society.
“Reshi’s rise as a spiritual leader is a sad commentary on our flawed understanding of Islam. This shows the ignorance of people, their blind faith in lunatics, besides lack of quest for real, original Islam”, Dr Hameed Naseem Rafiabadi, former head of the Shah-e-Hamdan Institute of Islamic Studies at Kashmir University, said.
Interestingly, sufism has a wide following in the Valley. They pay obeisance at graves of saints and shrines. Ironically, Reshi used to introduce himself as alambardar (torchbearer) and Rishi Buzurg (spiritually exalted saint). During his sermons, he admonished women without purdah and decried transactions based on interest and insisted on following spiritual leaders.
But as expected, the reaction to his arrest is mixed. On May 29, when this correspondent visited the area, there was a protest going on in Krimshore village. Shops were closed and people were out on the streets. The road was blocked with boulders. “He has brought a bad name to our area,” Ghulam Nabi Bhat, a white-bearded local prayer leader, spearheading the protests, said. Another protester shouted, “hang the offender”. There was also a Reshi disciple in the crowd, his lone talib who had surrendered before the crowd for his safety.
But barely a few km away at Shamsabad village, men and women were swearing by Reshi’s innocence and piety. They said he had been framed by his detractors. “I swear on the Prophet, he is haqq (a true saint). We did not even know how to pray and he taught us all”, a girl said from behind a veil. She said that the so-called victims might have been lured by money to testify against ‘our mentor’. His followers staged a protest in Srinagar, chanting slogans in his support.
Reshi’s followers guide you to his secret room. The unusually designed basement of the sprawling building has a row of small cells, many covered with curtains facing a podium on the opposite wall. “These (cells) are for meditation of girls”, Muhammad Rafiq Dar, his ardent follower for several years, says.
Outside the building, a long earthen oven under a tin-shed lies abandoned. “The girls have left. They never wanted to leave but some people forced them to vacate”, Nazia Akhtar, a neighbour, tells you.
Reshi’s stepfather claimed that he had no sexual cravings and cited this as a reason for his divorce some 15 years ago. “He was into spirituality. We got him married but the marriage lasted for just a week. The bride did not return to our house and then sought divorce after two years”, he said.
But police say, the claims of piety and impotency are false. They say they have evidence that he was engaging in sexual acts without a chance for conception. “The seized mattress is full of stains because Gulzar would ejaculate only on the mattress. He knew how to avoid a pregnancy,” Dar said.
The man would have been exposed much earlier had one of his victims not gone into mental depression, taken back to her home in a south Kashmir village and later immolated herself. “Possibly, she had conceived after being raped by Reshi and thought that ending her life would save her the trauma,” an Intelligence officer said. This girl’s brother approached the police after Reshi’s escapades became public.
As for the case, Reshi has sought bail and his counsel claims he is impotent and, thus, all allegations against him are fabricated. Cleric Qazi Yasir has asked people not to draw conclusions without him being put to a fair trial. Separatist leader Syed Ali Geelani has ridiculed sections who “follow self-made faith and hand over their wards to such tainted peers and quacks,” Geelani recently said in a statement.