The terrible truth about Chandigarh's much loved Zulfiqar Khan
They looked up to him. He promised to deliver them from the shackles of poverty, of illiteracy. He was their friend, their only mentor and they trusted him without ever questioning his ways. But then, he betrayed their faith. So horribly.
Zulfiqar Khan was widely admired for helping scores of seriously deprived children from Chandigarh's "labour" (slum) colonies get a decent education with dignity.
Something of a "slumdog" himself, in 1992, as Chandigarh and Punjab struggled to shake off the scourge of terrorism, Khan launched Theatre Age, a voluntary group that achieved exemplary success in getting kids from the city's poorest families to school. And how.
Starting out with 25 young boys, Khan began going around the city asking residents to donate old newspapers. Back at the labour colony in Sector 25 he trained the children to make paper bags that were in turn sold to local institutions and shop owners.
This, over the years, turned into an amazing enterprise with profits from the sale of paper bags being used to pay for the education of more and more children.
Alongside formal learning, Theatre Age equipped the children with vocational skills. And to keep them interested as well as raise additional money, Khan, a theatre actor and small-time director himself, produced and staged plays with his young apprentices winning accolades as well as substantial sponsorships.
Everyone chipped in. The boys were never turned away from any door they knocked on in Chandigarh. Journalists were especially supportive, invariably backing up regular contributions of old newspapers with news stories profiling the unique effort.
Khan had become a celebrity. He's still making the headlines but suddenly for all the wrong reasons.
On July 11, the Chandigarh Police arrested Khan on charges of paedophilia and forced homosexual acts.
Police say he was detained after a former associate submitted a written complaint along with photographs and names of juvenile boys Khan allegedly assaulted sexually. The complainant alleged that Khan had been victimising children under his care for many years.
At the time of his arrest on Saturday afternoon, Theatre Age had 72 children on its rolls. Between six and 18 years, Khan's charges are all from very poor families - street vendors', rag pickers', construction workers' children.
Police say Khan assaulted children in his care after drugging them with cold drinks laced with sedatives. The cops also suspect that Khan has been recording porn videos of his activities and circulating these amid "friends" on social media.
While the charges are under investigation and a court remanded Khan to police custody for a 24 hours on July 12, one somehow wants to hope that he is innocent.
Not because one can nurse even the slightest sympathy for a probable paedophile. But for the remote hope that innocent and unsuspecting children did not have to bear the terrible agony and trauma of a brutal emotional and physical assault.
But it's not looking good for the young victims. Police officers say the case against Zulfiqar Khan is "watertight."
Just a day after his arrest was reported in local papers, four others - three minors and a young man who had been with Theatre Age for many years in the hope of securing his future - have approached the cops with fresh complaints.