Islamists chopped off hand of Christian professor, but he blames his religious leaders for trauma

The question controversy

Joseph set the “controversial” question in a paper for an internal exam in Malayalam for second-semester BCom students after selecting a passage from a book on cinema by fellow CPI(M) activist and award-winning filmmaker PT Kunju Muhammed. That was March 2010.

In the controversial question, a person with schizophrenia asks Padachon — the Malayalam substitute for Allah or God — a stupid question. In response, God calls the man the son of a dog, a common insult in Malayalam. Dogs are also considered unclean in Islam.

Though that was a passage taken from the book of Kunju Muhammed, the man speaking to God was unnamed in the original text. The man was named Muhammad in the examination paper by Joseph.

This led to the interpretation that the Muslim community and its central text, the Quran, had been disrespected by the Christian professor, and that too before several students hailing from different religious backgrounds.

Subsequently, some people allegedly cooked up a story of blasphemy around the question paper and leaked it to a section of the media.

A prominent Malayalam television channel, which ceased operations four years ago for want of funds, telecast a sensational “exclusive” news item claiming the Muhammed mentioned in the question paper was the Islamic Prophet, and that the Christian professor had wilfully engaged in character assassination of the founder of Islam.

The fake news led to large-scale protests across the state, and the PFI and some other radical Islamic outfits were furious.

Speaking to South First over the phone from Ireland after his biography won the prestigious Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award, Joseph said he had no clue that the portion used in the question paper would be considered blasphemous.

He said he just explored the satiric element in the text. He also said the name Muhammad was chosen because it was also the name of the author of the essay, Kunju Muhammed. Moreover, the book was on the recommended reading list for graduate and postgraduate students of Malayalam.

A history of attacks

After the question paper courted controversy, Joseph had to go underground. To dodge arrest, he had to run from one city to the other.

Though he was eventually arrested from a Muslim-run lodge in Palakkad, he was soon released on bail.

But Joseph had no job to return to as the church had instructed the college to dismiss him.

In the subsequent months, he had to endure three attempts on his life. The fourth time, Joseph was returning home after church services on 4 July, 2010, with his mother and sister when a 13-member gang stopped his car and cut off his hand.

As the car was locked from the inside, the attackers broke a glass window and pulled Joseph out. Then they assaulted him and severed his hand.

The hand was reattached through a complex medical procedure within hours of the incident, and the inhuman act by radical Islamic elements elicited large-scale condemnation and led to sensation at the national and international levels.

Since then, a trial court has sentenced all the accused to jail terms ranging from three to eight years.

The court also completely exonerated Joseph from the charge of blasphemy. It stated in unequivocal terms that the Muhammad he mentioned in a college examination question paper had nothing to do with the Islamic prophet.

However, a letter was circulated among the laity in 120 churches around Joseph’s residence and read out at Sunday mass. It said the assault did not absolve Joseph of his wrongs, such as insulting a fellow religion.

A file picture of Joseph with wife Salomi, who died by suicide unable, to withstand the sufferings. (Facebook/TJ Joseph personal account)

The litigation Joseph initiated against his college to get re-employed ran for four years without reaching any resolution, and severely dented his family savings. As a result, Salomi went into depression and ended her life in their house in March 2014, exactly a week before Joseph was officially due to retire.

It was her suicide that caused widespread public anger against the college, and finally, the church allowed him to return to work for just one day: the final day of retirement.

That day’s work protected him from a unilateral termination and helped him access retirement benefits. Using the retirement benefits, he renovated the house and ensured his son and daughter had a better education.

Single-handed effort 

Joseph documented not just these incidents but his emotions as well in his memoir Atthupokatha Ormakal, translated roughly as “memories that cannot be chopped off”. Penguin Random House India recently brought out its English version with the name A Thousand Cuts.

The 431-page book, which has already turned into a publishing sensation in Malayalam, is being termed a scathing account of not just Islamic obscurantism but also of the dishonesty and betrayal committed against him by the Catholic denomination that runs the Newman College.

Though his right hand was reattached, Joseph still cannot use it freely: He wrote the manuscript of the Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award-winning book — for the Best Autobiography in Malayalam — using only his left hand.

While the award was declared on Wednesday, 27 July, Joseph was in Ireland with his daughter Aami and son-in-law Balakrishna.

He told South First over the phone: “I regard the recognition as an answer to my silent screams for a long time. I don’t want to call myself a victim. I am a survivor. This book is a mark of solidarity with ordinary people who are extremely insecure in the face of the continued denial of justice.”

Man vs church

TJ Joseph. (Facebook/TJ Joseph personal account)

“The way my college and the church treated me was worse than the punishment meted out by the fundamentalists. Even after my acquittal, the college had refused to take me back,” recounted Joseph.

“Islamic fanatics attacked me only once. But the Christian denomination to which I belonged did it repeatedly. They ruined the whole of my life since the incident by excommunicating me and terminating me from the job without citing any valid reason,” he said.

“My wife had committed suicide, unable to withstand the isolation and the financial crisis caused by the termination from the job. Now I am more a living martyr of Christian fanaticism than that of Islamic militancy,” he added.

In its bid to avert a direct collision with Islamic fundamentalists, the church had made him a scapegoat, alleged Joseph.

“To protect their vested interests, the church authorities attempted to portray me as a terrorist with heavy doses of Islamophobia. They excommunicated me and prevented the priests and laity from visiting me and extending help. There began the severe crisis engulfing my life even now,” he said.

However, that was not the case at the beginning of the ordeal.

“When the controversy emerged, the Syro Malabar denomination of the Catholic Church and the college management under it gave me all the support, convinced about my integrity and respect to all religions. But that did not last too long,” Joseph told South First.

“A church leadership meeting in Kerala was held soon, and everybody changed their stands after that. The meeting decided not to go against the PFI and other radical Islamic outfits. Then I was on my own. The adamant stand of the church supporting Islamic fundamentalism and the canard against me resulted in the PFI attack, resulting in the loss of my hand,” he said.

“I am sure that the false propaganda misled the Muslim organisation. But my own people terminated me from the job and excommunicated my family, despite knowing I was innocent. Their attitude resulted in a great deal of depression in my wife, Salomi, who finally committed suicide. I am a victim of false media manipulation propelled by Christian and Islamic fundamentalist groups,” claimed Joseph.

Even Kunju Muhammed believes Joseph is a living victim of the most brutal terror attack in the history of Kerala. The pain he endured throughout his life has now taken the shape of the book, said Muhammed.

Gritty comeback

As for the autobiography, Joseph sees it as a part of an attempt to make his stand clear on all the issues involved. “There are people who still misunderstand me and my intentions,” he said.

In general, the book details the tragic sequence of events that followed the brutal attack and the hardships Joseph continued to suffer after the death of his wife Salomi.

“My children lost their mother. She will not return. But I am regaining everything else with sheer determination and courage,” Joseph told South First.

He said he had also pardoned those who assaulted him. “The youngsters who attacked me were just tools of some big sharks. Some sick minds used those brainwashed youngsters against me. Why should I blame them?” asked Joseph.

“The Kerala society had to wait till Joseph’s hand was chopped off and his wife committed suicide to treat religious fundamentalism as a matter of utmost concern. Joseph’s autobiography establishes that no religious group is free from intolerance and obscurantism. The Catholic Church has mistreated him even after the courts exonerated him from the charge of blasphemy,” said Shaji Jacob, academic and writer.

According to Joseph, obscurantism and intolerance have no religion. And he was categorical in his stand against portraying all Muslims in Kerala in communal colours.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA), which probed the hand-chopping case, said the people who attacked Joseph were active members of the PFI and its political wing, the Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI).

According to the charge sheet, they intended to send a message to the public and other religions that anyone who offended the prophet or Islam would not be spared.

“I have never been against Islam and never attempted to disregard contributions of the prophet. If the church authorities valued my explanation and conveyed it clearly to the Islamic groups agitating against me, my hand might have been saved. Instead, the church portrayed me as a villain and facilitated the extremist attack on me,” alleged Joseph.