Headley’s CHICAGO

A complex network of surveillance cameras makes Chicago one of the most watched cities in the world. The city is synonymous with the ruthless,cold wind from Lake Michigan that has been a steadfast witness since the heydays of gangster Al Capone. In the shadows of its magnificent skyline,which is at the edge of the lake,the city is a crucible of beautiful architecture,crime,corruption,Blues music and the population’s 2.8 million American dreams. The wind charges the streets that Chicago’s two statesmen— Abraham Lincoln and President Barack Obama,both of whom changed America’s destiny — have walked on.
But the cameras were of no use when it came to Headley,who added a new characteristic to Chicago,connecting it to the vicious global network of terror.
Carl Sandburg’s poem Chicago referred to the Mid-western city as the “city of big shoulders”. Chicago and Devon Avenue were caught unaware as Headley shot his devious plan over the city’s “Stormy,husky,brawling” shoulders.

In 2006,Headley moved from Philadelphia to Chicago,which has a vibrant and large Muslim immigrant population. He lived just off Devon Avenue — Chicago’s colourful gateway for immigrants. The street thrives on stores that offer a pastiche of food and culture from the immigrants’ homelands.
If one were to imagine the passengers riding on the No.155 bus of the Chicago Transit Authority,which goes up and down Devon Avenue,in a formal conference room,they could be in a meeting of the United Nations. One can see faces from Africa,Latin America,Asia,Europe and North America get on and off the bus,which has become a vehicle of cross-cultural exchange.

Diversity is commonplace on the street. It’s not surprising then that no ears prick up even when a Somali woman in a hijab chats on the bus in broken Hindi with an Indian passenger. The demographic profile of the street’s population is constantly changing,but currently the South Asian pulse is predominant.

Indo-Pak businesses cover about eight to 10 blocks of the street. On this stretch,the latest Bollywood songs often blare from American cars at crossroads. Shah Rukh Khan,standing in his signature posture with his arms wide open,appears on posters pasted on store fronts owned by Indians and Pakistanis. Grocery stores stock rare Indian vegetables like bread fruit and tindora. People from all over the city throng the restaurants that offer specialties from succulent Pakistani beef behari kebabs to crisp South Indian vadas,which are sold with a simplified American name — the lentil donut.

There is a Hindu temple,church,mosque and gurudwara at different spots on Devon Avenue. This peace-loving,working-class community,which is grappling with a recovering American economy like the rest of the country,is where Headley took cover.
Devon Avenue’s Asian community and Headley had one thing in common; both seem torn between life in the East and West.

Headley was born with the name of Daood Gilani in Washington D.C. to a Pakistani father,Sayed Salim Gilani and American mother,Serrill Headley. According to news reports,the couple met while working together at the Pakistani embassy. Cultural differences,however,adversely affected their marriage shortly after they moved to Lahore with their son in 1960.
Headley’s mother returned to Philadelphia leaving him and his younger sister behind. Pursuant to the Pakistani military coup in 1977,she went to Lahore and brought Headley back to America. She ran a bar in Philadelphia called Khyber Pass.

Headley is believed to have taken on his new American name in 2006,just about the time he moved to Chicago. In his passport he included his maternal uncle’s name. He used his new identity to morph in and out of the different eastern and western avatars he would don as he traveled to India and Pakistan from America as a scout for terror group Lakshar-e-Toiba from 2006 to 2008. According to his plea agreement,Headley admitted to training with the group since 2002.

Last May,the FBI,Chicago Police and Joint Terrorism Task Force descended on Headley’s neighborhood with news vans in tow. Local news reports wrongly raised suspicions over alleged bomb-making activity in the basement of an apartment on North Artesian Avenue,a street just off Devon Avenue. Headley lived on the street,but the dots were not connected yet to draw him into the picture.
Over the next few days,mannequins dressed in embellished kurtas,silk sarees and intricately embroidered salwar kameez in the windows of stores owned by Indian and Pakistani businessman watched the media hysteria rise and subside in muted silence.

The people of Devon Avenue are hard-working immigrants. In October,Headley’s neighbours,including the Indians and Pakistanis who had brushed past him on the streets,prayed with him in the nearby Jame Masjid mosque or never heard of him — were in for a shock. Headley was arrested on terrorism-related charges at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport on his way to Pakistan via Philadelphia.

Syed Rashid Lateef,manager of Makkah Tours and Travel Inc.,on Devon Avenue says he knew nothing of Headley till a deluge of news reports established a connection between a deadly international plot that affected the homeland of his Indian and Pakistani neighbours and a man in his neighborhood.
“I couldn’t believe it. Such a big thing happened so close to us. We are just Indian and Pakistani people living here. This shouldn’t have happened,” Lateef says.

Richard Loundy,an American and president of Devon Bank,says no one in the neighborhood saw it coming. “There have been no overt problems here that could raise suspicions about the plans he had. No bombings or shootings,” says Loundy.
He has worked in the area for over four decades and has seen kaleidoscopic changes in the demographics. “It is always changing. For the 40 years that I have been working here,the street has gone from being Jewish and Catholic,then Greek,next Indian and Pakistani with a touch of Croatian and Russian,” says Loundy.

In his bank alone,as many as 37 languages are spoken among 107 employees. “Even in the school district here,75 languages are supposedly spoken among students. Devon Avenue is supposed to be the most multi-ethnic neighborhood anywhere in the city and possibly even in the world,” says Loundy.
Devon Bank’s strong Muslim customer base has made its unique Islamic loan programmes,in line with Shariah tenets,one of the most successful in America.
While Devon Avenue has much to be proud of,Gurukambal feels Headley’s arrest is creating a negative perception around it. “It’s human nature. When people hear negative information about a neighborhood,some people don’t want to be associated with it,” he says.

The American media reported that Headley frequented Zam Zam Restaurant with his co-conspirator Tahawwur Hussain Rana. But the owner,Mumtaz Rizvi,says the media has misreported facts. “Rana has been here but not Headley,” he says.
Rana,a Canadian citizen who was born in Pakistan,owns an immigration service business,Immigrant Law Center,and a grocery store and meat shop,Chicago
Grocers,on opposite ends of Devon Avenue. Headley and he had attended school together in Pakistan. Headley attained a business visa to visit India and Denmark on the pretext of expanding Rana’s business overseas.

“Every day,we are dealing with so many customers. He (Rana) came here like any other customer and we provided him snacks he ordered. He looked like a gentlemen,talking and dealing nicely,” Rizvi says. He says the Headley saga is “hurting” his business,famous for offering Chicagoans delicious Pakistani breakfast fare such as hot halwa poori.
Against the backdrop of the numerous charges Headley pleaded guilty to,and the consequences of the terror strikes in India,Devon Avenue’s distinctive cultural anomalies,such as Indian and Pakistani unity,seem paradoxical.

The terror strike in Mumbai widened the rift between India and Pakistan. In the Indian sub-continent,the term “Indo-Pak” is used before divisive terms such as borders,wars and peace talks that predictably fall through. But on Devon Avenue,“Indo-Pak” is found on signboards of restaurants,beauty salons,travel agencies and grocery marts.
Where the quiet,tree-lined street on which Headley lived meets Devon Avenue,a sign carrying an honorary street name reads Gandhi Marg. Other parts of Devon Avenue have been named after Muhammad Ali

Jinnah and Sheikh Mujibur Rahman,the father of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajeed.
Besides surveying hotels,such as The Taj and Oberoi Trident in Mumbai,Headley also checked out the Jewish Chabad Houses across India during his many trips. According to news reports,Headley pretended to be a Jew while staying at the Chabad House in Mumbai. The FBI found a book called To Pray as a Jew in his bag when he was arrested at the city’s O’Hare airport on his way to Philadelphia and then Pakistan in October.

In Devon’s international setting,Headley could not have escaped exposure to Jewish culture.
Orthodox Jews were some of the early settlers on Devon Avenue before and after World War II. Many moved to the suburbs,such as Skokie on Chicago’s North Side,in the ’70s and ’80s just as the South Asians were moving in. It was an opportune time for Jews to sell their properties and businesses to South Asians,who’ve now established the area as their stronghold.

But many Jews still live in the area. Devon Avenue’s western side is named after Golda Meir,the fourth prime minister of the state of Israel who grew up in Milwaukee,Wisconsin. It has a Russian memorabilia store,the popular Georgian bakery and Tel-Aviv Kosher bakery besides Jewish schools and synagogues. Friends of Refugees of Eastern Europe,an organization started in 1969 to help Russian Jews who arrived on American shores after fleeing the Soviet regime,has its Chicago chapter on Devon Avenue.

Mufti Haroon Firdausi,39,is a religious leader who lives on Chicago’s North Side. He has been a guide to pilgrims from Devon Avenue on Haj trips during the last seven years. He says he has “never heard of any tension” in the area between Muslims and Jews. “They abide peacefully. This shows that people can live amicably together,” he says.

Firdausi says Muslims with beards and heads covered with taqiyahs rush to Jame Masjid on Fridays. And on the same road,he notes,just as the Jewish Sabbath day begins in the evening,the scene reveals Orthodox Jews with beards,black coats and hats and women dressed austerely.
The Hindus,Muslims and Jews partake in local politics. The local Alderman,the position equivalent to an Indian district collector,Bernard L Stone,is a Jew. “The Indians and Pakistanis work together and have been supporting Alderman Stone,” Firdausi adds.

“They — the shop-owners,restaurant owners,travel agency guys,cab drivers and others — are not only members but leaders of the community. The imam at the Khutba (sermon before prayers) on Fridays reminds them that they are representatives of their religion,” he says.

In a back alley on Devon Avenue,slaughtered goats on giant hooks are being unloaded from a truck into the back door of a meat shop. Even non-Asian restaurants on Devon Avenue,such as Italian Express and Zapp Thai,serve halal and kosher meat in line with the residents’ religious beliefs.
Firdausi draws attention to the teachings of the Quran that say animals must be treated with kindness and slaughtered in a humane way. Headley’s conspiracy led to the death of over 163 innocent civilians in India. So to him,Headley’s acts are abominable.

“The last two to three generations (of South Asian immigrants) have been exemplary citizens,professors,doctors and engineers. They now are professionals. This really blows everything off. Terror links set alarms ringing,” Firdausi adds.
The Headley saga has created some subliminal tension on Devon Avenue. A Muslim waiter at Usmania Restaurant when asked about Headley quickly responds,“I am Indian. Headley was Pakistani. I don’t know him.”

“It used to be just about us. In such a situation,it can become us (Indians) versus them (Pakistanis),” says Gurukambal. He feels just “one bad element” can affect one’s psyche.

Spring is back about a year since Headley’s story began to unfurl. The magnolia buds on the tree-lined streets have unfolded their light pink petals,the mannequins sport new fashions inspired by the latest Bollywood trends,the imam’s call to prayer diffuses into the listless breeze and cardinals are singing in the trees.

On Headley’s street around late afternoon,a little boy in a taqiyah cap rides a bicycle in joyful abandon. Headley has been sentenced to life imprisonment. He seems oblivious to his neighborhood’s state of shock. His sweet smile captures the unshakeable spirit of Devon Avenue.
“The scars will remain but life goes on,” Gurukambal says.

(The writer is pursuing a graduate programme at

Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism with a focus on international reporting. She is currently based in Evanston,Illinois and reports from Chicago.)