Police accused of standing by in Delhi riots
Videos show Hindu mob destroying mosque and burning shrine as religious violence leaves 42 dead
THE blackened walls of the burnt-out Muslim shrine in New Delhi stood out above the ruins of the small houses and shops – all torched in a frenzy of interreligious violence that swept across the Indian capital last week.
The clashes left 42 dead and more than 150 injured as Muslims and Hindus confronted each other in the streets following months of nationwide protest against a divisive new “citizenship” law that discriminates against India’s large Muslim migrant population.
The Muslim community said the shrine was set alight – as was a mosque a few streets away – while the police stood idly by, failing to quell a Hindu mob that left many with horrific injuries, including gunshot wounds, acid burns, sword strikes and genital mutilation.
Hindus and Muslims have given contradictory versions of how the protests started in the cramped alleyways and a public square of Chandbagh in northeast New Delhi following a demonstration by Muslim women against the Citizenship Amendment Act.
The Act recently passed by India’s parliament fast-tracks naturalisation for migrants of other religions over migrant Muslims from neighbouring Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan that are part of India’s 200millionstrong Muslim population.
It is seen as the latest provocation from Narendra Modi, India’s Hindunationalist prime minister, whose ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has a long history of stoking anti-Muslim sentiment for political gain.
As the blows from the sticks rained down on the women protesting against the Act, men joined the women. Soon, locals said, Hindus and Muslims were hurling stones at each other and shops and houses were torched.
When the violence flared, the police were accused of standing by as a Hindu mob climbed on the mosque and began to tear it down. Houses and businesses nearby were also smashed and looted.
A spokesman for New Delhi police denied that police had aided rioters but a clutch of videos circulating on social media appeared to show policemen looking on as the rioters hurled stones from the rooftops.
Some even showed police looking on and appearing to help rioters collect stones.
Though the authenticity of these videos could not be confirmed independently, they have ignited a fresh wave of anger in a country that was born out of a frenzy of communal violence that followed the Partition of imperial India in 1947.
More recently, in 2002, more than 1,000 people were killed in three days of savage religious riots in the state of Gujarat, which followed an attack on a trainload of Hindu pilgrims by Muslims.
Some 800 Muslims died in three days of “revenge” pogroms, with witnesses recalling how some victims were disembowelled in the streets, including a pregnant woman.
Mr Modi, who was then the chief minister of Gujarat, was widely accused of abetting and condoning the violence, but denied this.
The ethnic violence can be unspeakable in its savagery. In this latest outburst the Associated Press reported that one man had his legs spread so widely that the lower half of his body was torn apart.
Mr Modi and the ruling BJP have made huge electoral gains since the 2002 riots, with increasingly divisive electoral campaigns pitting Muslims and Hindus against each other.
However, the BJP has been frustrated after it lost elections in New Delhi on Feb 12 to the regionally powerful Aam Aadmi party headed by Arvind Kejriwal, the current Delhi chief minister.
Delhi has seen the sharpest polarisation with rallies in favour of the Act and incendiary videos of the burning of a mosque in the neighbourhood of Mustafabad, where the Hindus and Muslims have been living alongside each other.
On Friday, a handful of paramilitary force personnel were stationed outside the burnt mosque, trying to prevent a revenge mob from gathering again, but the burnt copies of the Koran on the wooden shelves have left the Muslims boiling with anger.
“This is an open attack on us,” said Phool Hassan Khan, who runs a small toy manufacturing business in Chandbagh. “Despite the unprovoked attacks, we are being painted as vandalisers. Police have failed to take action against those who featured in the videos burning the mosque and the shrine.”
The smartphone videos shared on social networking sites and through WhatsApp groups show a group vandalising a mosque and policemen looking on as a group of youths hurl stones from the roof of a private health facility in north-east Delhi. Another showed a young man climbing the minaret of a mosque to hoist a saffron flag – the symbol of Hindu nationalism. The man tore down its metal spire while two accomplices watched from below, their faces obscured by masks.
Alok Kumar, a senior Delhi police official, said that the videos and any involvement of the police personnel was being investigated.
“We deployed the police in good strength and foiled the protests from two communities,” he added. “We have established widespread contact with the local people and strict action is being taken against those people who tried to disturb peace.”
Nalin Kohli, a BJP spokesman, denied allegations that speeches by some BJP leaders had deliberately provoked the mob attack against the Muslims, saying that the issue was not “simplistic” and required a “wider discussion”.
Meanwhile, back on the streets, Minaj Pahalwan, 50, the caretaker of the Chand Baba shrine, which had been burned, was out clearing up the debris, his hands smeared in the soot that now blackened its walls.
The shrine had been a popular place for Muslims to tie votive threads to its doors to seek fulfilment of their wishes.
“The BJP has declared a war on the Muslims. We feel unsafe and fear that the country will get partitioned,” said Mohammad Hassan, 28, who runs a tailoring shop in one of the neighbourhoods of Seelampur in Delhi.
One woman, who gave her name as Shazia, 20, said that her family called the police after her 22-year old brother, Mehtab, was wounded in a mob attack on Tuesday, but they didn’t come to their rescue.
Later when she found her brother
‘The BJP has declared a war on the Muslims. We feel unsafe and fear that the country will get partitioned’
dead at a local hospital and the body was carried home, she said that the police didn’t allow the burial and took away the body.
“The police have aided and abetted the murder of my brother,” she said at her small house in a gated neighbourhood of Mustafabad.
A few streets away from her house, Riyaz Ahmad, 46, who works as a civil servant, said that the mob had attacked the mosque as the people were praying inside, leaving at least three people including a cleric badly injured.
“It was all orchestrated and planned. It wouldn’t have been possible without the active connivance of the police authorities. The people poured petrol on the mosque and then lit it up,” he said.
As the dust settled yesterday, a handful of police personnel walked the narrow lanes and by-lanes making announcements on loud hailers, asking people not to congregate, but for many residents the police concern was as much an insult as it was a reassurance.
“The police have started the patrols when the damage has already been done,” Mohammad Javed Khan, a local resident, observed bitterly. “It is too little, too late.”