As riots continue, tension spreads Home minister tells political parties to help restore peace
On Day 3, riots spread, clashes broke out in new areas. Journalists were targeted, property damaged. Toll rose to 13. After two days of failing to control violence, police managed to clear some areas
NEWDELHI: Around 7pm on Tuesday, a large posse of security personnel marched towards Chand Bagh, a Muslim-dominated locality in north-east Delhi, as reports of violence reached their wireless sets. In another halfhour, an armed mob gathered near a petrol pump in Gokalpuri and torched two vehicles, forcing the police to send a fresh deployment in the neighbourhood, less than 2km from Chand Bagh.
It continued over 24 hours as the violence spread from the Main Jafrabad Road and localities in vicinity to the large maze of narrow interconnected lanes across north-east Delhi.
On several occasions, as the epicentre of the violence kept changing within a 5-km radius from time to time throughout Tuesday, rioters could often be spotted dispersing on being chased by the police and rapid action force teams, disappearing in the lanes and then re-appearing as a group behind police teams chanting slogans hailing them and demanding crackdown against residences of neighbouring localities, which were largely Muslim-dominated pockets.
What started on Sunday as a clash between groups opposed to and supporting the amended citizenship law within a kilometre stretch in Jafrabad snowballed into a full scale communal riot by Tuesday. Shooting, arson and stone pelting was reported from several areas on Tuesday, including Maujpur, Chand Bagh, Kardampuri, Bhajanpura, Gokalpuri, Khajoori Khas, Yamuna Vihar and Brijpuri – pockets that are spread across the main road where protesters ran riot on Tuesday, shooting and pelting stones at each other, burning shops and houses and attacking media personnel.
By Tuesday night, as many as 13 persons had died and 253 were injured. Several of them sustained bullet injuries. The nature of violence though remained the same on Tuesday but it spread to a much larger area, indicating a complete failure on part of the police and security agencies to contain the rioters. “I don’t know why you people call it violence. People feel threatened and, hence, they are responding,” said Narayan Bansal, a resident of Brijpuri who was part of a group standing close to a torched vehicle in the area.
By 8pm, all lights on the arterial road that connects the Yamuna Pushta region with Loni in Ghaziabad-delhi border – passing through Bhajanpura, Chand Bagh, Yamuna Vihar, Brijpuri and Gokalpuri – were switched off. Several security officials deployed on the stretch claimed that it prevented them from being targets of the armed mobs.
However, several residents in the localities debunked that logic. “The lights were switched off only to help the rioters. The police did nothing to stop them and the darkness helped them to pretend that they did not learn about violence,” said Gulfam Chaudhary, a resident of Chand Bagh whose neighbour’s house was set alaze by a mob.
BYPL, the local power discom, did not reply to repeated calls seeking a comment on who switched off the lights.
In Gokalpuri, where rioters set ablaze a tyre market late Monday night, a car accessory market was burnt on Tuesday. In most cases, the rioters blocked roads for fire tenders.
Delhi’s fire department chief Atul Garg said that 70 fire incidents were reported in the area on Tuesday. Five fire trucks were damaged.
Things turned bad in the afternoon when a fire tender driver was thrashed by a mob in Gokalpuri, following which other fire truck drivers said that they would not attend calls in the area unless assured of security by the police. Garg confirmed the incident.
Around the same time, mobs also stopped private vehicles on the road, identified drivers and occupants by their religion and thrashed them. HT met several of them on the Gokalpuri –
Yamuna Pushta stretch on Tuesday. “It was around 20 of them. They asked us our names, snatched our documents and started thrashing us. They damaged the vehicle too,” said Mohammad Nawab, who ferries goods from the Bawana industrial area to markets in the transyamuna region. Nawab was bleeding from his nose and head.
Several shops in Bhajanpura were looted with rioters breaking the shutters and windows and stealing the stuff. In Khajoori Khas, many vehicles were torched.
One of the most densely populated working class neighbourhoods in Delhi, the areas around the Main Jafrabad Road, also knows as Asharam Tyagi Marg, have witnessed several skirmishes and riot-like situations. In December last year, thousands had gathered on the main road to protest against the CAA and pelted stones at the police. In September 2006, the area had erupted in protest against the sealing of illegal commercial spaces. Massive stone pelting had taken place then and three people died in police firing.
However, the violence over Monday and Tuesday is unprecedented for the area since it has never witnessed a full-scale communal riot. Roughly 25 lakh people live in the area in plot sizes as smaller as 25 yards or 20 square metres. Over five decades, what was a slum area has proliferated into a massive human settlement. There are mixed pockets of Muslim as well Hindu population in the area.
When a local resident in Maujpur was spotted recording the violence from his terrace, procaa men pelted stones at him until he was hit and he chanted religious slogans to prove he was one of them. The mob broke his door, but called off any further attack.
In Brijpuri, some political leaders had organised a “peace march” around 2 pm. Several locals claimed that the situation went worse after that. While those on the Hindu-dominated pockets said that the Muslims hurled stones at them during the march, those in the Muslim pockets said that the Hindus vandalised their houses during the march. Around 4 pm, lanes in both Hindu and Muslim pockets of Brijpuri and neighbouring localities had broken glasses, torched buildings and vandalised shops.
Delhi police spokesperson, MS Randhawa said the main reason for violence escalating was is the area has a mixed population and is congested. “Police have registered 11 FIR to probe the cases of rioting.situation is under control. There are some stray incidents. We have deployed additional and sufficient forces,” he said.
NEWDELHI:UNION Home Minister Amit Shah has requested all political parties to form so-called peace committees in various neighbourhoods in North-east Delhi, comprising their representatives and local community leaders to control the violence. He also asked them to work with Delhi Police to restore order and quell rumours.
Both requests were made during a high-level meeting chaired by Shah and attended by the Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal, members of various political parties, and senior bureaucrats and police officers. As many as 13 people were killed in the clashes.
Shah cancelled his visit to Thiruvananthapuram on Wednesday, although it wasn’t immediately clear whether he was staying back to oversee the capital’s return to normalcy. The home ministry did not immediately ascribe a reason for the change in his schedule.
During the meeting, the home minister asked all “political parties to avoid provocative speeches and statements,” the Union Home Ministry said in a statement. He also wrote to the family of Rattan Lal – the Delhi Police head constable who was killed when deployed Maujpur, one of the affected areas – expressing his grief and offering his condolences. In his letter to family, the minister described Lal as a “courageous” officer.
Shah’s meeting with representatives of political parties, senior bureaucrats, and police officers, including Delhi Police Commissioner Amulya Patnaik, was the second in 24 hours. On Monday night, he held a latenight meeting after returning from the Namaste Trump event at Ahmedabad. Shah advanced his return after reports of rioting and arson reached him.
“The minister was to reach Delhi late yesterday night; however, he flew out hours ahead of schedule,” a senior home ministry official said on condition of anonymity.
The riots, which started off as clashes between pro- and anticitizenship Amendment Act protestors, came at an inconvenient time for the Centre -- during US President Donald Trump’s inaugural state visit to India.
The borders of Delhi with Uttar Pradesh and Haryana have also been under surveillance for the last three days and Delhi Police has been taking adequate steps, the home ministry said.
Shah also noted that “the Delhi Police” was a professional organization and “adequately empowered to decide on the amount of force needed to diffuse tension where necessary,” the ministry’s statement added.
Although initial assessments indicated that Delhi Police was outnumbered by rioters, Delhi Police Commissioner Amulya Patnaik denied this. “We have enough manpower and total support of the government,” he told news agency ANI.
“The home minister assured that Delhi Police will be deployed in full strength. It appears earlier that police deployment was less but we were assured it will be adequate,” CM Kejriwal told reporters after the meeting. “Army may be deployed if needed but at present police taking action.”
“We have all agreed to rise above politics and ensure the situation is brought under control,” Manoj Tiwari Delhi BJP chief said.
Senior Delhi Congress Subash Chopra who attended the meeting said “inflammatory statements by political figures triggered the violence”. He was referring to statements by Delhi BJP leader Kapil Mishra.