Pakistan's angel of death

Kala Shah Kaku, Pakistan - Malak al-Maut (the angel of death) was once, it is said by Islamic theologists, one of God's favoured angels; a loyal servant who was entrusted with separating people's souls from their bodies, when their time came.

To the righteous, it is said, the angel of death appears in a friendly form, a companion come to ease one's passage to the other side.

For those who have sinned, however, the angel appears as a terrifying beast, a demon come to wreak divine judgment and wrench their souls away to eternal damnation.

For most prisoners on Pakistan's death row, he appears as Sabir Masih.

A family legacy

Since 2006, Masih has been one of three executioners in Pakistan's eastern city of Lahore, the capital of Punjab, the country's most populous province. Although he says that he does not keep track, he claims to have hanged more than 250 people since he started work.

Masih comes from a family of executioners. His father, Sadiq, hanged prisoners for 40 years before retiring in 2000. Masih's grandfather and his brothers all did the same work, too. Indeed his granduncle, Tara Masih, hanged Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Pakistan's first elected prime minister, in 1979.

Tara had to be flown from Bahawalpur to Lahore because the executioner at Lahore's Kot Lakhpat jail - Sabir's father Sadiq - refused to hang the popular leader.

As a child, Sabir Masih always knew he would end up in the family business.

"I knew that this was a family profession," the 33-year-old explains, sitting cross-legged in his maternal uncle's simple home, about 25km outside of Lahore.

He was 22 the first time that he killed a man, a convicted murderer whose name he cannot recall.

"I didn't know anything at that time. I had just seen a man hanged once in front of me," he says. "I saw [my teacher] tie a noose once, the second time I did it myself.

"When I pull the lever, I don't really think about it. You pull the lever, the man falls," he says. "My focus is on the sign, from the jail superintendent."

It was his first day on the job.

I am killing people based on the law. The murderer has killed by their choice, but I am not killing by my own choice... I have not picked the convict to kill.

Within eight months, he says proudly, he had already executed 100 men, "completing his century", as he puts it.

In 2008, however, Masih's work came to an abrupt halt, as the newly elected Pakistan People's Party government placed an unofficial moratorium on executions. That measure remained in place until December 2014, when armed men stormed a Peshawar school, killing more than 150 people, most of them children.

The attack shocked the nation, and the government quickly lifted the moratorium, as a warning to members of armed groups such as the Pakistan Taliban, known by the acronym TTP, and others who had attacked both state and civilian targets in a war that has lasted since 2007.

Within a matter of hours, Masih was en route to Faisalabad from his native Lahore, to keep an appointment with two men convicted of "terrorism".

"There were news reporters everywhere," he says, recalling the crowd outside his home when the moratorium was lifted. "I sent a friend twice to go out and check … then I slipped out and went to Faisalabad."

'It's nothing'

Since then, Pakistan has executed at least 471 people, according to the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP).

Last year, it ranked fifth on Amnesty International's list of worldwide executioners, putting at least 87 people to death. Almost all of those cases were in Punjab province, with Masih carrying out many of them.

"Why should I keep track? The jail keeps records. They have books to keep track of the black warrants," he says.

Masih takes an uncomplicated approach to the question of whether the death penalty is justified.

"This is the law of our country, what am I meant to feel about it?" he asks. "It is nothing, it is just a job."

Further probing on the subject seems to elicit annoyance, a mild irritation at questions he thinks miss the point of what he does for a living.

"It's nothing. Only that minute or half a minute is urgent, when they are bringing the convict to be hanged. Other than that, it's simple," he says, detailing how he measures out the length of rope and ties the knot based on the height and weight of the convict.

Sometimes, he concedes, he gets it wrong.

"You'll see a person's body torn apart. I've done it many times."

Masih speaks at an odd rhythm, as if just slightly out of time with the world around him. As he picks at his yellowing teeth with a matchstick, he complains that people seem to make more of his job than is warranted.

"For the person who is observing it being done, it seems a huge thing to do ... but it's easy, it's not a big deal for me."

"It's nothing," he repeats throughout our conversation.

Fair trial concerns, however, have dogged Pakistan's justice system, and specifically its use of the death penalty, for years.

Last year, the Supreme Court of Pakistan acquitted two brothers, Ghulam Qadir and Ghulam Sarwar, of murder, after they had spent more than 10 years on death row. The only problem? Qadir and Sarwar had both been executed at Bahawalpur's central jail in October 2015.

Masih had pulled the lever.

"I didn't feel anything," he says, of when he heard the news of the acquittals. "If anyone is going to feel tension about it, it would be the jail superintendent, or the deputy, or the chief minister. I didn't issue the black warrants, did I?

"It's nothing."

'They're finished from the inside'

In a sense, Masih concedes, he sees prisoners at their most intimate, in a moment where there are no longer any pretences.

"Yes, I see a face of theirs [that others do not]," he says. "At that time, they are crying. Either from the inside or the outside."

Some, he says, ask for forgiveness - from him, from the jail superintendent, from anyone who will listen.

"They're finished, from the inside. The convict who has done it, they know that they have to accept their fate."

Others, however, exult in their deeds.

One execution that Masih says will always stay with him was that of two men convicted for facilitating a suicide attack on then Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf in 2004. They were hanged in December 2014.

"They came to me 12 minutes before their hanging. They were raising slogans, and greeting each other happily as if they were at Eid prayers. They said that they were bound for heaven," he says.

"They accepted that they had done everything that they had been accused of. They were happy about it."

What, then, does Masih see as the difference between himself and those men? Or, rather, between himself and all of the murderers that he has executed over the years? Is there one?

"What I do, it is different," he says, emphatically. "I am killing people based on the law. The murderer has killed by their choice, but I am not killing by my own choice. On my side, I have the whole state, all the way to the president. I have not picked the convict to kill.

"It's nothing."

Source: Al Jazeera, Asad Hashim, October 15, 2017. Asad Hashim is Al Jazeera's Web correspondent in Pakistan.

‘You never forget the sound of a body dropping into the pit’: An eyewitness account of an execution

A former Pakistani prisoner describes the horrific experience of seeing one of his fellow inmates being executed.

Jails get quiet when prisoners hear an execution warrant has been issued.

Like every other jail in Pakistan, Sahiwal Central Jail was full. Of course, by full, I mean holding twice as many prisoners than it was built to support. If you put thousands of men in cages, it can get loud. I barely slept at night when I was a prisoner there for 10 years. The sounds of men snoring, crying and sometimes screaming in their sleep will keep you awake.

The exception was when we knew that one of us was heading to the gallows. We would get silence, but we would lose our sleep.

They would quietly separate the prisoner with the execution warrant from the general population of the prison. We all knew then that his time had come.

Even those of us who were not on death row would tense up. Held like animals in a pen, we would turn to the one thing that we could do: pray. We would collect in groups, praying to a higher power – because the power on the ground was not listening – to spare his life, for mercy to replace vengeance, for a miracle.

We would know that the deed had been done when the prison guard, charged with counting the prisoners every morning, would be late. On normal days, he would turn up at 5:30 am. On an execution day, he would arrive by 8:00 am. That day, none of us would speak. The televisions and radio would be silent.

Jails in Pakistan are always clean because prisoners are in charge of upkeep. They do not have much to do to while away the time. So they clean. But sometimes, they also help with carrying out the execution.

The prisoners helping out with the execution are responsible for removing the body, after it has remained suspended for 30 minutes. This is a requirement under Pakistan’s Prisons Manual. They also clean the corpse, and hand it over to the family that waits outside the prison gate with a charpai and a set of clothes. The family is also told to arrange an ambulance at their own expense.

Prisons have a graveyard where unclaimed bodies are buried. There are not that many graves there, though. Many of us have families. Demonised as we are by the rest of the world, there are still people who remember us as humans, not criminals. We do mean something to somebody.

Witnessing an execution

I was asked to witness an execution of one of my fellow inmates in 2006. Mami Pabal was a burly man, at least six feet tall with a booming voice. He had been at Sahiwal Central Jail for years and had befriended many of us. Even the prison officials liked his company. It was easy to forget that he had been accused of murder. He used to joke, “There are a lot of crimes I should be in here for – but this murder is not one of them.”

When death unnecessarily came for him, he cried like a small child.

He was escorted to the gallows. Half-carried would be more accurate. The Medical Officer, Magistrate, jail Superintendent, blacksmith, and two men from the victim’s family were there. The jail staff who were present kept reminding the victim’s family of the option to forgive Mami.

The superintendent told him to recite the kalma. I don’t think Mami heard him. He kept crying out that he had not done it, that he was innocent, that killing him would be murder, not justice. Even after they placed the hood over his face, Mami spent his last few breaths begging for his life.

There are barely any state executioners in Pakistan, despite having one of the world’s largest death rows. That day, he was not available. So instead, the jail warden pulled the lever. Before he did, he bowed his head and said, “I’m helpless Mami. I’m obligated to do this. If you can, please forgive me.”

You never forget the sound of a body being dropped into the pit. The way the beam creaks is not loud enough to drown out the choking, the sound of a bone breaking. The only dignity they give him, is that at least you cannot see his tongue lolling out of his mouth as he gasps for breath.

The power to take a life has a humbling effect on prison officials. They, too, are taken aback by what they have done. They would be less harsh with prisoners the next day. After all, they have also lost someone who they have seen day in, day out, often for years.

No job should require this much of you.

Sohail Yafat was falsely accused of murder in 2001. He spent ten years in jail before he was acquitted without any charge. Sohail narrated this story to Rimmel Mohydin, who put it in form of an article.

This article first appeared on Dawn.

Source: scroll.in, Sohail Yafat, October 15, 2017

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"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted." -- Oscar Wilde