“Beimaan ki maut mat maro. Dua karo tumhari maut imaan ki halat mein ho. Khuda ka khauf karo... sahi salamati ki dua karo” (Don’t die a death of a coward. Pray that you die in faith... fear of God... pray for well being).
The voice of the muezzin was loud and clear on the loudspeakers of the Hazrat Tipu Masjid, opposite Dr Maqbool Ahmed and Dr Zakia Ahmed’s house in Banshankhari II Stage, Bangalore.
A message of peace and well being, it was for all those who have gone astray and left the path of faith.
The Ahmeds are parents of Kafeel, the alleged suicide bomber in the foiled car bombings in London/Glasgow last week and Dr Sabeel, a co-accused in the terror plot in Britain.
“They (Ahmeds) should be shot for bringing a bad name to Muslims. It is because of people like them that the community is being hounded world over. They have shamed India,” shouted secretary to the Masjid, Mohammed.
According to him, the Ahmeds joined the Tableeghi Jamaat — a radical Islamic group three years ago. “They started interfering in our mosque and that’s when we told them to go away. They wanted to impose their rules and told us to stop offering the fateha and take off the lights that we have put outside the mosque. Our boys don’t go there for collection,” he said.
The mystery around the Ahmeds deepened on Friday with residents of Banshankahari II Stage saying they know “nothing” about them. “We have no idea who visits them. Some people come but they are not from this area. They don’t have any friends  or relatives here,” said Pasha, a resident of the area.
“They don’t mingle with anyone here or shop here. They go to the masjid at Jayanagar 9th Block. They are a different class. They never spoke to us, so today, when they are in trouble, why should we sympathise with them?” said Munnavar, a shop owner. Nobody knows the Ahmeds — not the grocer, the barber, the butcher or the area old newspaper vendor. “We’ve seen them but we don’t know who they are,” said Wazir, the poultry shopowner.
A life of absolute seclusion and “snobbery”, the Ahmeds are hounded by the thought of what could have happened to their sons.
And even as British media reports confirmed that Kafeel — the eldest born to the Ahmeds would not survive, with 90 per cent burn injuries, Maqbool and Zakia hope that the suicide bomber lying in Royal Alexander Hospital at Paisley is not their son.
“That’s our hope and prayer too. We still haven’t got any confirmation about Kafeel,” said Sadia, sister of Kafeel and Sabeel.