'I still have PTSD from my time in jail, 20 years of my life have been destroyed'

Former Post Office manager Kamran Ashraf had just become a father of two when he was wrongly convicted.He tells Katie Strick why ITV's new drama has given him the strength to speak out

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THERE’S a memory I often think back to before this nightmare started. It was 2001 and my wife Siema and I had just bought the

local Post Office in Hampstead Heath. We had everything we wanted — kids, a business of our own — and it felt like everything would continue to go to plan, as long as we worked hard. We were in bed one night and I said, “I really hope this bubble doesn’t burst.”

We must have jinxed it that night, because boy did that bubble burst. Less than two years on, everything started to go wrong when we were told we’d racked up a shortfall of £25,000. Like so many other sub-postmasters and postmistresses, the 20 years since have been a hellish roller coaster of being separated while I was sent to jail, losing our family home and having to beg our parents for enough food to feed our children.

We watched ITV’s Mr Bates vs The Post Office from our home in Winchmore Hill. We’re on a big WhatsApp group with hundreds of the other victims and everyone was feeling more or less the same in the build-up to the show: looking forward to it, but also dreading it because there’s so much emotion and suffering. We were worried it would be triggering to see our lives played out on screen again, and that the producers might not fully get our message across. Thankfully, we’ve been surprised both by the show and the huge public and political reaction since.