At A bustling junction in Beed's Juna Bazar area, a predominantly Muslim section of the city, men jostle for space as they wait to buy milk early on a Monday morning. Nearby, at the small eatery 'Kwality', Mirza Inayat Baig, 63, is already at work behind a heap of fresh jalebis.
At his home down the road, tucked in a corner of the modest Kamwada Galli, Inayat's eldest son Tahreq, 35, is getting ready to join his father at work. The night before, he had a long conversation with a defence lawyer in Delhi. And he has spent the morning scanning the newspapers for new developments.
The Baigs have a reason to believe that any day now could bring good news. Reports of arrested Indian Mujahideen operative Yasin Bhatkal's "confession" that the February 2010 German Bakery blast in Pune was carried out by him along with Qateel Siddiqui have left a question mark on the case against Inayat's son and Tahreq's younger brother Mirza Himayat Baig.
It was in this case that Himayat was sentenced to death on April 16, the only person convicted for the bombing.
Currently lodged in Mumbai Central Prison, Himayat has filed an appeal in the High Court against his conviction. The 32-year-old computer teacher has always claimed his innocence. The Baigs think Himayat will finally be heard.
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Himayat grew up in the same cramped house at Kamwada Galli, sharing its two rooms with his parents, Tahreq and his family, younger brother Shahzad and an elder sister.
The family always had high hopes of Himayat, the only one among them to have made it to college. "Wo to hamari family ka main aadmi tha (He was the main man of our family)," says Tahreq. "Our father is uneducated, as is Shahzad, who drives an autorickshaw. I too studied only till 10th."
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