No food for Muslims forced out of village
Forced to leave their village in western Rajasthan following alleged threats from upper caste Hindu villagers, about 20 Muslim families are now staring at another crisis.
The district administration, which arranged a temporary shelter for them in Jaisalmer, has failed to provide them food for last two days. Lack of facilities at the shelter has left them, especially women and children, in the lurch. Around 150 members of these 20 families do not want to return to their homes in Dantal, around 700km from Jaipur. They have urged the district administration to shift them to another safer location.
The families left their village following a string of events that began with the killing of a Muslim folk singer, allegedly by a Hindu priest and his brothers. Priest Ramesh Suthar, a traditional occultist, has been arrested while his brothers are absconding.
This exodus from the area has invited criticism from civil society. “What is the administration doing? A whole community of 200 people had to move out of the village to exile,” People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) said in a statement.
In a statement Kavita Srivastava, Rajasthan president of PUCL said: “The kind of lawlessness in the state, such brutal aggression by dominant castes; lynching of an untouchable by the dominant castes and other castes actively supporting the killers as he is a ojha (faith healer) is deplorable.”