Two faiths, and a story marred by hate
: On Tuesday night, 25-year-old Syed Ashrin Sultana could not stop smiling. Her husband Billipuram Nagaraju had walked in the front door of their home in Hyderabad, carrying a set of newly purchased books, to help her prepare for competitive government examinations. His move was typical of a marriage that was the stuff of fairytale. A couple that had fought the odds, their families, religious and caste differences, to build a life together. Twenty-four hours later, on Wednesday night, Sultana saw Nagaraju killed on the street before her despairing eyes as she pleaded for help, beaten to death by her own brother. It took all of 24 hours to turn a fairytale into tragedy.
At 9.30pm on Wednesday, Nagaraju, also 25, was returning to his rented home in Hyderabad’s Saroornagar with Sultana riding pillion; the two were chatting about their lives. In dramatic visuals captured by mobile phone footage, the two were waylaid by two men, Syed Mobin Khan, Sultana’s brother, and Mohammad Masood Ahmed, her cousin, near the Panjala Anil Kumar Colony.
The couple fell to the ground, and even before Nagaraju could stand, he was pounced upon by the two men. Mobin began attacking him on his head, while Masood Ahmed stabbed the prone Nagaraju repeatedly. “There were so many people around but none of them came to his rescue. I fell on the feet of my brother and pleaded with him to spare my husband, but he kicked me away. I tried to shield
Raju with my own body, so I could be beaten instead of him, but they pulled me away,” Sultana told HT on Friday morning.
Within minutes, only after a bleeding Nagaraju was completely bloodied and motionless did the assault end. Her brothers stood over the body for a time, before they made their escape. Only then did passers-by muster the courage to approach Sultana’s husband in an attempt to help. He was already dead. In the days that have followed, full of national headlines about yet another hate crime, the Saroornagar police have arrested both Mobin and Masood under sections of murder and the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, and remanded them to 14-days judicial custody on Thursday.
Their story
Nagaraju was born in the block headquarters of Marpally of Vikarabad district. Sultana’s village of Ghanapur, was 10 kilometres away. Their school though, the government school in Marpally was the same, as was, years later the government junior college in the same town. “I can’t pinpoint how and when we became good friends, which turned to attraction. I can only say that we felt that we were made for each other,” Sultana said. The 10km distance between their villages prevented suspicion, and the inevitable outrage. Nagaraju was Dalit, the only son of Srinivasu and Anusuya, both agricultural labourers and lived in a small “Indiramma house” (sanctioned by the government during the Indira Gandhi regime).
Sultana’s family was poor too, having lost her father Syed
Shakil Ahmed when she was a child. The only breadwinner for Sultana and her mother was brother Mobin Ahmed, who was a fruit merchant. In 2019, Mobin moved to Hyderabad’s IDPL colony in Balanagar. Soon, Nagaraju followed, moving to his uncle’s home in Balanagar. Living in the same city was dangerous, but it was terrain they found ways to navigate. “Though we were in love for a long time, we did not make any wrong moves. We wanted to get married only after settling in life. Both of us joined an undergraduate course in commerce, but in different colleges. We didn’t even meet regularly and only kept in touch over the phone,” Sultana said. They both graduated, and while Sultana found a part-time job at a local SBI branch, Nagaraju became a salesman at an automobile showroom, dabbling in real estate on the weekends.
The struggle
In 2021, Mobin and his mother began looking for a husband for Sultana. She tried to buy time. “I told them I did not want to get married immediately and I wanted to study. But they would not listen,” she said. The family found 20 “matches” for Sultana, but she rejected them all. “My brother grew suspicious. He started checking my mobile phone and found out about Raju and came to know about my love,” she said.
As the couple had foreseen, there was outrage, and Mobin took to beating his sister often. He threatened Nagaraju of dire consequences. Initially, there was no support from Nagaraju’s parents either. His uncle, Thangadapally Ganesh said, “All his parents wanted was for him to escape the life of being an agricultural labourer. They were not happy at first, but eventually came around.”
The couple beseeched her family, and Nagaraju even offered to convert to Islam if religion was the impediment. “He told me several times that if my brother accepted our alliance, he was ready to become a Muslim. But my brother stoutly rejected the proposal,” she said.
On January 30, things came to a head after Mobin caught her talking to Nagaraju on the phone. “He beat me so much that my clothes were drenched in blood,” she said. That night, she disappeared from her brother’s home, leaving her mobile phone behind. They had already planned their escape, and they landed at the Arya Samaj Mandir at the Lal Darwaja in the old city of Hyderabad, where they were married. Before the marriage, as per Arya Samaj rules, Sultana converted to Hinduism and picked the name Pallavi; the couple moved to a small rented accommodation in Saroornagar.
The Balanagar police registered a missing persons case on February 1, following a complaint from Mobin, but with both Sultana and Nagaraju being adults, took no action. “Members of both families were called for counselling at Mominpet police station in Vikarabad district in the first week of April. When the couple expressed a threat to their lives, Mobin Ahmed gave it in writing to the police that he would not do them any harm,” Ganesh said.
The letter meant little though, and Mobin began tracking Nagaraju’s movements, and on Wednesday, executed the killing.
‘Will stay with my in-laws’
Shattered with the murder of Nagaraju before her very eyes, Sultana is now inconsolable, their dreams shattered. For the weeks before the tragedy, the couple had spoken about their aspirations, hers of being a Group 1 officer, her husband’s of becoming a businessman. “In fact, Raju sacrificed his career for me. He wanted to study further as well, but since he had both me and his poor parents to take care of, he buried his ambition and took the salesman job. He worked so hard that even on the weekends, he began a part time job at a real estate firm so we would be happy. All he wanted was that I complete my post graduation, and become a government officer,” Sultana said.
On Thursday evening, Sultana stood firm and participated in the rituals as Nagaraju was cremated at Marpally. When the Vikarabad deputy superintendent of police BV Satyanarayana offered to rehabilitate her at a State Home for Women in Hyderabad, she refused. She said, “No. I will stay with my in-laws in this village. I will take care of “athamma” (mother-inlaw). And I will never return to my parents.”