TRIVANDRUM, 7 December 2005 — Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy yesterday appealed for royal pardon to a Kerala youth reportedly lodged in a Dammam jail.
According to reports, Abdul Lateef Naushad, 34, injured a Saudi national’s eye during a 2003 fight subsequently causing him loss of sight. A court later sentenced him to suffer similar plight.
“I have sent a fax to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s office. I will talk to him personally as soon as he is back from his Moscow visit Wednesday,” Chandy told Arab News. “Let us hope he will get a reprieve,” he said.
Naushad, a shop assistant attached to a petrol station was the sole breadwinner of the family comprising his parents, wife and two children at Anchal near Quilon.
On Monday, Naushad rang up his wife Shuhaila to say that he hoped the man who took him to court would show mercy.
He answered in the negative saying that he was confident of being pardoned and would return home soon. Suhaila then handed over the phone to media persons.
Suhaila married Noushad eight years ago and the couple has two children, a five-year-old son and a two-and-a-half-year-old daughter. Noushad was arrested and jailed a few days before Shuhaila delivered her daughter. But she was informed about it only 40 days after the delivery.
