Mumbai: His sister and brother in law were killed in the Mumbai terror attack but actor Ashish Chowdhry is not rejoicing the hanging of Pakistani Ajmal Amir Kasab who he says was "brainwashed".
Kasab, the sole surviving gunman of the 2008 attack, was hanged in Pune on Wednesday, after his mercy plea was rejected by President Pranab Mukherjee earlier this month.
"Why should I rejoice Kasab's death? I will rejoice when little innocent children will stop being taught to kill," Ashish tweeted.
"I sympathise with Kasab. He also was once a small innocent baby, like my son. But unfortunately born around wrong people and wrong teachings.
"I'm sure as a little baby, Kasab didn't plan his outcome. He was brainwashed, driven to kill in the name of god. He didn't know he was wrong," he added.
Kasab was hanged five days before the fourth anniversary of the Mumbai terror attack that claimed 166 lives. Nine of his associates, who were killed, had been secretly buried in the city in January 2010.
Ashish's sister and brother in law were held hostage and killed while having dinner at the Oberoi hotel, one of the targets of the terrorists.
"I will not teach my children to rejoice anyone's death be it Kasab. They will learn to be non vindictive, non fanatical and will love all. I'm not saying that I defend the consequence he faced.
"I just feel that rejoicing, or feeling completion doesn't make sense. There's more to it," said Ashish.
"In these four years of awaiting and looking upon Kasab's sentence, I can bet lakhs of new Kasab's were born. Problem lies there. Rejoice when that stops," he added.
'We have gotten justice'
Meanwhile, other families of victims in the 2008 attack said they felt justice was served following Kasab's hanging.
"The first thing that comes to my mind is what happened is good. We are happy that we have got justice," said the wife of a railway ticket collector who was killed in the 26/11 Mumbai carnage.
Ragini Sharma, whose husband S K Sharma was killed in the 2008 terror strike, said she would like to thank the President for rejecting Kasab's mercy plea. "I would like to thank the President. However, it got delayed but we did get justice. I am happy that it (the hanging) was done secretly, otherwide some human rights people would have opposed it," she said.
Vishnu Zende, an announcer at the Chhtrapati Shivaji Terminus, the railway station in the west Indian city which was one of the targets of the attack, said he is "very happy that [Kasab] has been hanged."
"All the people who died in the terror attack have been given tribute by hanging him," said Zende, who had helped save many lives by making announcements over the public address system in the station about the strike.
