But for the judiciary, I would have been eliminated, says Dr Kafeel Khan after his release

AGRA: “What a relief and I have only the judiciary to thank for this. Left to UP government, they would have eliminated me,” said the controversial paediatrician Dr Kafeel Khan to TOI minutes after he walked out of the Mathura prison at midnight following his release on the orders of the Allahabad high court that also set aside the NSA charges imposed against him, on Tuesday.

Khan was charged under the NSA for his alleged inflammatory statement in Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) by UP government walked free after seven months in jail.
Best birthday gift ever received, says Shabista Khan on husband Kafeel Khan’s release
After coming out of the jail, Khan thanked the judiciary for a "brilliant" order that had exposed the UP government's false, baseless and fictitious case against him. He claimed that he was initially harassed for five days by not being provided food and water.
Khan also thanked the Special Task Force (STF) for “sparing his life” when he was brought to UP from Mumbai after his arrest on Jan 29. Khan said that he was not going to his hometown Gorakhpur as he feared for his life. “I’ll be staying away from UP for some time," he said.
“I am being victimised as I have questioned the state government to name the real culprit behind the death of nearly 60 children at the state-run BRD Hospital in Gorakhpur due to oxygen shortage,” said Khan.
"I still under suspension even after no medical negligence had been proven against me," he added.
Khan told TOI that he had crossed the UP border safely and was heading to another state as he could be “eliminated” by government. “I am taking my family with me and will spend some quality time with them, as I had missed them a lot,” he said, adding, they too had suffered a lot.
“My son, Oliver Khan, was just 11 months old when I was lodged in Mathura jail. Now he has started saying ‘papa’ as my wife told me. Hence, I want to feel and live every moment with my children and family,” Khan told TOI.
He further said he would celebrate his wife Shabista Khan’s birthday with his daughter Zabreena’s birthday, which was on August 24.
Recalling the ill-fated day of January 29 when he was arrested by STF from Mumbai airport, Khan said that STF personal harassed him badly for 24 hours by asking unnecessary questions.
“I was accused of making an attempt to topple the state government and I had made some kind of powder to kill people etc,” Kafeel said that such “absurd” questions were asked from him repeatedly.
The harassment did not end here, it continued in the jail too, claimed Dr Khan. He added that he was not provided food, water, toothpaste till February 3.
“I was not even allowed to talk about BRD incident in the jail,” he said, adding, Mathura jailor, Arvind Kumar Pandey, who retired a day before his release, had harassed him a lot.
The conditions inside the jail, which he had highlighted in his letter too were “pathetic”. “It was a horrible stay. One stinking toilet, overcrowded prison as 1,600 prisoners were present there against the capacity of 530,” said Khan, adding that he had passed his time by writing his book on oxygen tragedy in state govt run hospital in Gorakhpur and he had finished some part of it.
He said he wants to now serve the people in the flood-affected states by organising medical camps there. “Floodwater increases the risk of communicable diseases like cholera, malaria, dengue etc and I want to organise medical camps there to help people,” said Khan, adding, he wanted to also do research work for Covid-19 medicines, as he had earlier done intensive work for Encephalitis. He had written a letter to the PM in this regard.
In Video:Allahabad high court directs Dr Kafeel Khan’s release, sets aside detention order under NSA