Mr. Mirani, student, activist and asylum seeker in India had, on numerous occasions, received death threats from members of the Islamic Association of Students in Aligarh.

Information about the death of Mr. Shahram Mirani was obtained through Abdorrahman Boroumand Center’s interview with an eye witness and close friend of the victim (Jan. 13, 2022) and with a former political activist and student in India (Sept. 3, 2021, Feb. 22 & 25 , 2022, July 29, 2022). Additional information was obtained from India Today magazine (Oct. 8, 1982), Brigham Young University Scholars Archive (Mar. 12 , 2013), the website of Creative Anarchy (Nov. 2 , 1997), records of “Be Yad Ar”, Clubhouse (Aug. 21, 2021), Shahrvand magazine (Oct. 1, 2015), the weblog of “Dard-e Moshtarak” (Jun. 11, 2019), Enghelab-e Eslami newspaper (Dec. 29, 1979), Imam Khomeini Portal (Sept. 1, 1979, Aug. 28, 1980, Jan. 4, 1981, Nov. 3, 1981), Gozaresh be Mardom (“Report to the public”) published by Nashr-e Baran, written by Ali Akbar Omidmehr (2001-2002), interview with Mr. Ali Akbar Omidmehr (June 3, 2022), Djahan publication (Dec. 18, 1982), Oral History of Iran (“Tarikh-e shafahi-ye Iran, date of research June 21,2022), United Press International (Aug. 17, 1982).

Mr. Shahram Mirani was born in Kermanshah. He was the only child of the family. Prior to going to India, he had worked - as an ice vendor in the villages around Kermanshah - to save money for his studies in India. Mr. Mirani left Iran after the 1979 revolution to study sociology in Pune (Poona); he later moved to Aligarh in Uttar Pradesh. He had political views of the Left, was a sympathizer of the Marxist-Leninist organization of the Fadaiyan Khalq (Minority), and was active in student associations. He lost the benefit of the foreign currency allocated at a  preferential exchange rate to overseas students, which allowed him to fund his studies, as a result of his political activities against the Islamic Republic. He had applied to the United Nations to seek asylum (interview with an eye-witness, Jan. 13, 2022; Facebook pages of Emdad in Iran, Mar. 11, 2021).

With a few other like-minded students, Mr. Mirani had started a campaign to disseminate information about the events in Iran. They distributed pamphlets and newspapers on the campus, amongst the academics and active Muslim students telling them of the repressive practices of the Islamic Republic such as raping girls in custody, inflicting qisas  [the Islamic penalty of retaliation], and executing the opponents. On several occasions, he and his friends had received threats from the members of the Islamic Associations of Students, as a result of which they feared for their security. To alleviate their anxiety and fears for their safety, they often commuted in groups and held their reunions in a location outside the campus. They also briefed the university officials and the police of the threats they had received.

Friends of Mr. Mirani described him as “ an energetic, gregarious, good hearted, sincere, and witty individual,  steadfast in his commitment to his ideals; a man who could not remain silent before injustice and cruelty inflicted upon the vulnerable.”(interview with an eye witness, Jan 13, 2022; Be Yad Ar, Clubhouse, Aug. 21, 2021).

The Fadaiyan Khalq Organization

The Fadaiyan Khalq Organization, a Marxist Leninist group inspired by the Cuban Revolution and the urban guerilla movements of Latin America, was founded in 1971 by two communist groups opposed to the Pahlavi regime. Following the 1979 revolution, the Organization, which had renounced armed struggle, split over their support of the Islamic Republic and of the Soviet Union. The Fadaiyan Khalq Minority opposed the Islamic Republic and was active mainly in the political arena and the labor movement. 

Background of Extrajudicial Killings by the Islamic Republic of Iran

The Islamic Republic of Iran has a long history of politically motivated violence in Iran and around the world. Since the 1979 Revolution, Islamic Republic operatives inside and outside the country have engaged in kidnapping, disappearing, and killing a large number of individuals whose activities they deemed undesirable. The actual number of the victims of extrajudicial killings inside Iran is not clear; however, these murders began in February 1979 and have continued since then, both inside and outside Iran. The Abdorrahman Boroumand Center has so far identified over 540 killings outside Iran attributed to the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Dissidents have been assassinated by the agents of the Islamic Republic outside Iran in countries such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Japan, India, and Pakistan in Asia; Dubai, Iraq, and Turkey in the Middle East; Cyprus, France, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Sweden, and Great Britain in Europe; and the United States across the Atlantic Ocean. In most cases, there has not been much published, and local authorities have not issued arrest warrants. But documentation, evidence, and traces obtained through investigations conducted by local police and judicial authorities confirm the theory of state committed crimes. In some instances, these investigations have resulted in the expulsion or arrest of Iranian diplomats. In a few cases outside Iran, the perpetrators of these murders have been arrested and put on trial. The evidence presented revealed the defendants’ connection to Iran’s government institutions, and an arrest warrant has been issued for Iran’s Minister of Information.

The manner in which these killings were organized and implemented in Iran and abroad is indicative of a single pattern which, according to Roland Chatelin, the Swiss prosecutor, contains common parameters and detailed planning. It can be ascertained from the similarities between these murders in different countries that the Iranian government is the principal entity that ordered the implementation of these crimes. Iranian authorities have not officially accepted responsibility for these murders and have even attributed their commission to internal strife in opposition groups. Nevertheless, since the very inception of the Islamic Republic regime, the Islamic Republic officials have justified these crimes from an ideological and legal standpoint. In the spring of 1979, Sadeq Khalkhali, the first Chief Shari’a Judge of the Islamic Revolutionary Courts, officially announced the regime’s decision to implement extrajudicial executions and justified the decision: “ … These people have been sentenced to death; from the Iranian people’s perspective, if someone wants to assassinate these individuals abroad, in any country, no government has any right to bring the perpetrator to trial as a terrorist, because such a person is the implementing agent of the sentence issued by the Islamic Revolutionary Court. Therefore, they are Mahduroddam and their sentence is death regardless of where they are.” More than 10 years after these proclamations, in a speech about the security forces’ success, Ali Fallahian, the regime’s Minister of Information, stated the following regarding the elimination of members of the opposition: “ … We have had success in inflicting damage to many of these little groups outside the country and on our borders.”

At the same time, various political, judicial, and security officials of the Islamic Republic of Iran have, at different times and occasions, confirmed the existence of a long term government policy for these extrajudicial killings and in some cases their implementation. 

Read more about the background of extrajudicial killings in the Islamic Republic of Iran by clicking on the left hand highlight with the same title.

The background of Iranian students' movements in India

The British colonial presence in India bestowed this country with an education system and establishments similar to those in the developed countries. Those features combined with the lower cost of living and education in India made that country a choice destination for higher education for middle class Iranians since the Qajar era. Thus Iranian students' movements in India have a long history: at least since 1970s student activists opposing the monarchy of the Pahlavi dynasty joined groups such as the Mojahedin Khalq Organization, the Fadaiyan Khalq, Tudeh Party, the Union of Iranian Communists, the Ranjbaran Party of Iran, either as members or as sympathizers. 

The sympathizers of Ayatollah Khomeini gradually formed the Islamic Association of Students in the late 1970s; the associations were in competition with secular groups particularly those with leftist and Marxist worldview. However, rivalries stopped at the methods they applied to recruit new members from amongst not-yet- committed students, and ideological debates in their periodicals (Oral History of Iran, Jun. 21, 2022). Following the victory of the revolution in February 1979 and the ascent of Khomeini to power as the leader of the revolution, tension spiraled between political groups inside the country, such as the sympathizers of Shapour Bakhtiar and later some other Leftist groups, such as the Fadaiyan Khalq (Minority) and the Mojahedin Khalq Organization, on the one hand, and the supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini, on the other. Opposing groups of overseas students defied one another in violent confrontations. (Boroumand Center research) 

Dissidents of the Islamic Republic circulated handouts and newspapers reflecting what was happening in Iran: from executions to the practice of corporal  punishment, e.g. flogging, in accordance with the Islamic law of Shari’a, to other instances of human rights’ breaches; they also held public rallies and demonstrations in protest against the events inside the country under the newly established regime and Ayatollah Khomeini (interview with an eye-witness on Jan. 13, 2022). In India, some students joined a committee called "Solidarity with Human Rights and Democracy"  formed by a group of Indian activists; they organized demonstrations in protest against the Islamic Republic of Iran and the presence of some of their officials in India, e.g. during the visit of Hashemi Rafsanjani, the then president of the Islamic parliament, who visited India in the summer 1982. (Be Yad Ar, Clubhouse, Aug. 21, 2021; Shahrvand magazine, Oct. 1, 2015)

Sponsored by the regime in Tehran, the Islamic Associations of Students in India applied the resources and facilities made available to them by the Islamic Republic to further expand their activities. The available information reveals that there was a direct link between the Islamic Associations of Students and Iran's embassy and consulates in India. According to Aliakbar Omidmehr, in charge of students welfare in the consulate and the temporary head of the chancery in India in 1979, members of the Islamic Associations of Students benefited from allowances paid out directly from a special fund secretly set up in the consulate for that purpose (interview with Abdorrahman Boroumand Center, Jun. 3, 2022). Certain members of the Islamic Associations of Students in India were later appointed to prominent positions, e.g. as members of the parliament, or ambassadors, chargés d'affaires or attachés in foreign countries(Report to the Nation , 2001-2002, published by Boroumand Center). There have been various reports relating the discriminatory treatment of students in pecuniary matters: students who backed the regime benefited from direct financial assistance, while for other students the entitlement to the foreign currency at preferential exchange rate granted to the overseas students was made contingent upon their ideological outlook. According to a statement issued by the head of chancery of the Islamic Republic in Hyderabad on Oct. 8, 1982,  "pursuant to a decree issued by the ministry of higher education only students who have attended and successfully passed the ideological appraisal are eligible for the  preferential exchange rate applied to overseas students (Jahan publication, Dec. 18, 1982). In his memoirs, Aliakbar Omidmehr evokes how, in 1979, the supply of foreign currency to overseas students who opposed the Islamic regime was discontinued.  (Report to the Nation, 2001-2002) 

Apart from the practice of a discriminatory treatment of opponent students designed to reinforce the Islamic students, the regime seized every opportunity created by the visit of an official to a foreign country to organize meetings with the members of the Islamic Associations of Students to exhort them to check the activities of the other political groups (Boroumand Center research). In a meeting with the members of the Islamic Association of Students, Ayatollah Khomeini urged the students to "endeavor to make Islam known to the world", he said; " this is a unique asset that no one else has...it is your duty to make it known to the world..." (Imam Khomeini Portal, Sept. 1, 1979). In another meeting with Iranian students studying in India he said: "the superpowers...have toiled to distort the image of the Islamic movement of Iran. We must endeavor... we must take heed of what is right and ensure that the right shall prevail in all Muslim countries...where a few astrayed individuals in India or Pakistan and other Muslim lands attempt to deface our Islamic movement, you, the Islamic brethren who are present in those lands have a duty  to stand up to them (Imam Khomeini Portal, Aug. 28, 1980). An opponent of the Islamic Republic in India stated that those who were in favor of Ayatollah Khomeini resorted to violence and engaged in altercations with his opponents to confine their activities. He said "when they saw that we had our own publications on the campus, they attacked us; they even attacked the university residence hall where we stayed to set fire to the place. They had done so in other cities. When they saw us in the street, they threatened us. (interview with an eye witness, Jan. 13, 2022) 

In December 1979, Ayatollah Hossain Nouri Hamedani, a radical cleric, was despatched to India as the special envoy of Ayatollah Khomeini to investigate the condition of the Muslims and the Islamic schools in India and Pakistan, and evaluate their needs and shortfalls with a view to remedy the situation (Imam Khomeini Portal, Dec. 27, 1979). According to one of the students present in the meeting held between the ayatollah and the members of the Islamic Associations of Students, the ayatollah motioned to the male students, then turned to the women and unleashed: "these are outright bums, else no one would have ever dared to hand out a single tract defying the Islamic Republic". The-said student added: "After that meeting, members of the Islamic Associations conducted themselves even more viciously towards the students of the opposing groups so much so that for years we didn't dare walk around by ourselves and remained constantly on guard." As soon as a tract was handed out, they attacked us (interview with an activist student in India, Feb. 22 & 25 , 2022). Reports of assault, kidnapping, and assassination of students who were members of groups opposing the Islamic Republic in India were rife in the local press in those years. In May 1982, supporters of the Islamic Republic unexpectedly assaulted a group of students opposing the regime; the incident left one student dead and a number wounded (India Today, Jul. 15, 1982). In Sept. 1982, numerous reports on demonstrations of the opponents of the Islamic Republic in Bangalore were published, reporting violent assaults perpetrated by supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini on demonstrators with the subsequent death of one and injuries of many students. 86 students were arrested following the incident (Clubhouse, Aug. 11, 2022; Shahrvand, Oct. 1, 2015). Enghelab-e Eslami newspaper reported a clash between the students who were for and against Ayatollah Khomeini in Bangalore in those days and reported 10 wounded and 14 arrested during the clashes (Enghelab-e Eslami newspaper, Dec. 29, 1979). Notwithstanding the arrest of a number of people in each case, almost at no time a case was referred to a court of law or the Indian officials took a formal position in view of the events. An article published in India Today about the clashes between Iranian students in India, also gave account of the increasing economic ties between the two countries and the increased supply of crude oil to India after the Islamic revolution and during the Iran-Iraq war (India Today, July 15, 1982). The two countries had  pursued and agreed upon a policy of increased economic transactions in different sectors, including nuclear energy in the early 1980s during a visit by Mr. Hashemi Rafsanjani to India. (United Press International (Aug. 17, 1982)

The Assassination of Mr. Shahram Mirani 

Shahram Milani was attacked by a group of supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini and members of the Islamic Associations of Students in India on June 9, 1982, between 9pm and 10pm near the residence hall of the Islamic University of Aligahr. The attackers used clubs, knives, and an iron rod; Mr. Mirani suffered heavy injuries, was transferred to a local hospital and died shortly afterwards as a result of severe head injuries. (India Today, Jul. 15, 1982; interview with an eye witness, Jan. 13, 2022; Be Yad Ar, Clubhouse, Aug. 21, 2021)

The attack took place when Shahram Mirani and a group of like-minded students, who opposed the Islamic Republic, were returning from a political meeting to the residence hall on the campus where they lived. The attackers, about 100 people, were supporters of Khomeini and members of the Islamic Associations of Students. During the attack, one person was killed and 14 were injured (India Today, Jul. 15, 1982). According to an eye witness, the assailants "wore black gears and screamed God is great, Khomeini is our leader as they attacked". Local residents said before the start of the attack,  the street lights on the path to the residence hall were smashed, so that when Mr. Mirani and his companions passed through, the area was pitch dark. (interview with an eye witness, Jan. 13, 2022, Be Yad Ar, Clubhouse, Aug. 21, 2021)

More than 100 members of the Islamic Associations of Students of India and supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini participated in the attack against Mr. Mirani and his companions. Mr. Mirani was killed as a result of severe head injury and internal bleeding.

An eye witness who was also a close friend of Shahram Mirani said when the assault took place, he was riding a bicycle and Shahram was his passenger. "He was pulled down by 4-5 people; they attacked him with knives, an iron rod, and a nailed club. His fingers and ribs were all broken and blood was bursting out of his artery". His friends took his wounded body to the Jawaharlal Nehru Hospital after the attackers fled the scene but the doctor who examined the body told them that he was not going to make it. The doctor said he had suffered 25 hard blows on his head and brain; the death was caused by severe head injuries and the breaking of an artery. His last word was for his mother.  In Kurdish, he told a friend on his bedside: "ask my mother to forgive me".(interview with an eye witness, Jan. 13, 2022)

His family and friends endeavored to repatriate his body to Iran, but their considerable efforts remained fruitless. He was buried on June 11, 1982 in Aligarh University cemetery. (Clubhouse, Aug. 21, 2021; India Today, Jul. 15, 1982)

According to the information available, the attack had been planned in advance. Nearly a week prior to the attack a significant number of members of the Islamic Associations of Students in India had traveled to Aligarh to attend the Associations’ meetings which were to be held on June 1-5, 1982. They were in town on the day of the attack. The opposition students had informed the police of their movements on June 8, 1982. The majority of the 300 students in Aligarh University were against the Islamic Republic at the time. Saeed Hamid, the then deputy dean of the university told India Today: "he feels that the students who backed Khomeini had received support from outside the campus". He confirmed the presence on the campus of Hossain Barkhordari, the press attaché of the embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran in New Delhi and a former graduate of Aligarh University,  just an hour before the start of the attack. Mr. Barkhordari had been seen in a vehicle that belonged to the embassy of the Islamic Republic. A number of the students opposing the Islamic Republic also believed that Hossain Barkhordari had led the attack. (India Today, India Today, Jul. 15, 1982; Dard-e Moshtarak weblog, June 11, 2019)

Iranian Authorities’ Reaction

When local authorities and the district judge of Aligarh approached the embassy of the Islamic Republic to coordinate the repatriation of the body of Mr. Shahram Mirani to Iran, the embassy replied that “the government of Iran has no connection with Mr. Mirani,  he is not a citizen of Iran”. Nonetheless, after the burial of Mr. Mirani in Aligarh, the embassy of the Islamic Republic in New Delhi reacted to the news circulating that Hossein Barkhordari, the press attaché of the embassy, had been present on the campus on the day of attack. The embassy refuted the claims and issued a press release in which it stated that “the investigations about the assassination have progressed without us being informed and the body has been buried without prior consultation with us.” (India Today, Jul. 15, 1982)

According to India Today, the embassy of the Islamic Republic had refused to respond to the queries of the Indian press in relation to the assassination of Mr. Mirani, and did not cooperate with Indian authorities including Mr. Hamid Saeed, the deputy dean of Aligarh University, and the district judge of Pannalal Pune. (India Today, Jul. 15, 1982)

According to a former student and political activist, the individuals who were arrested in connection with Mr. Mirani’s assassination were released before long “on heavy bails paid by the embassy of the Islamic Republic”(interview with a former student and political activist in India, Jul. 29, 2022)

Indian Authorities’ Reaction

When the students opposing the Islamic Republic warned the district chief of police in Aligarh about the “suspicious presence of a large number” of the Islamic Associations’ members in India coming from across the country to Aligarh, the police notified the outlanders to leave the city before June 8, 1982. The authorities assured the students that the outsiders had moved out of the campus. (India Today, Jul. 15, 1982, Dard-e Moshtarak weblog, Jun. 11, 2019)

Two days after the attack, Mr. Sidou, the chief police of Aligarh, seemingly deeply unsettled by the incident, visited the injured students in the hospital and presented them with gifts and apologies for failing to protect them and to ensure their safety. (India Today, Jul. 15, 1982)

Thirty-four assailants were identified by the students (India Today, Jul. 15, 1982); the police arrested 20 individuals in relation to the killing of Mr. Shahram Mirani. Some were members of the organization of the Fedayian Khalq (Majority)(Dard-e Moshtarak weblog, Jun. 11, 2019). Later, the police arrested another person, who had a major role in coordinating the assault;  he had been identified by students in Pune, but was exchanged against another person while in detention. (interview with a former political activist in India, Jul. 29, 2022)

Family’s Reaction

The family of Mr. Mirani made every effort to obtain permission for burying their son in Iran.  Their request was declined. 

In 2014, Mr. Mirani’s mother appeared in the gathering of the “Mothers of Khavaran”(1) carrying a photo of her son; she was seeking justice. (interview with Abdorrahman Boroumand Center,  Sept. 3, 2021, Shahrvand newspaper, Oct. 1, 2015; Dard-e Moshtarak weblog, Jun. 11, 2019)

Impact on the Family

For many years, Shahram Mirani’s mother traveled to India to lay a wreath at the tomb of his beloved son notwithstanding the hardships of the long journey to Aligarh. (Dard-e Moshtarak weblog, Jun. 11, 2019)

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1- Khavaran is the name of a burial ground located south of Tehran where thousands of political prisoners and prisoners of conscience, who were executed after the revolution, particularly those executed following the summer of 1988, are buried in mass graves. Burials in Khavaran took place in secret and graves bear no names. The “Mothers of Khavaran” is an epithet used for the mothers and the women who gather in this location as a gesture of remembrance of their children and loved ones.