By V.K. Tripathi
On September 22, 2007, Batla House (Okhla) Delhi witnessed a confrontation between hawkers/ residents and police. In the same area few years ago an innocent person was killed in police firing. Hence, as newspapers on September 23 carried the news prominently on the front page about the incident, many people in other parts of Delhi felt alarmed. I got the news bit late as I was away to my village. At noon on September 23 I talked to Ajay Sahay, a close friend and Gandhian activist who works among the slum dwellers in the area. At 4 PM I left for Okhla.
I got down from the bus at Escorts and walked to Batla house. As I passed by Jamia Millia Islamia main gate, there was a large crowed of students who had just emerged from an examination. Their faces were relaxed and showed no signs of anxiety. A Rapid Action Force (RAF) van was standing near by. As I walked further, life looked normal. I talked to a few rickshaw pullers and others about previous day’s incident, they said it was a localized incident, nothing happened anywhere else.
At the T point, from where Batla House locality begins, there were vans of RAF. The entry road to Batla House locality is about 30 feet wide. There used be hawkers on both sides of the road, selling fruits and other merchandise. Today there were no hawkers. But people were walking as usual, their faces reflecting the serenity of fast. I began talking to them individually. Each one said there was an incident yesterday on this road but everything became normal within two hours. It was around the time of roza aaftar (6-6:30 PM) a hawker was selling religious books on his rehdi. A police man pushed his rehdi. In the process few books fell down. Some people said, the police pushed the books (that included Quran Sharif) by his leg and that created unease and protest. Most others would ignore it and expressed satisfaction that everything was settled within two hours. I saw two people carrying a banner “Mah-e-Ramzan sabr ka sandesh deta hai” (the month of Ramadan gives the message of patience). The same was overwhelmingly reflected on the faces of multitude of people who were buying fruits and other items in the Batla House market just prior to roza aaftar. There was anger.
Returning back to T point, I talked to RAF police men. They said every thing is normal but they had no details of the previous day incident. I gave Sadbbhav Mission Patrika to their officer and walked to Okhla Police Chawki which was mentioned in the papers to have been put on fire by the angry mob. From a distance it did not look like a major fire. I went inside the Chowki premises. There were dozens of police men deployed from several branches of police. I talked to an officer. He said that the fire was set the previous day. When I said the wooden doors of the rooms appear intact, he said, the back side was burnt, 8 motor cycles were also burnt inside the premises. Later I saw one room from inside. Its ceiling had signs of fire. He also told that Shaheen Bagh police chowki was also burnt. I walked 2 km to Shaheen Bagh police chowki and talked to police over there. But there was no sign of fire any where. Then I returned back to Okhla Chowki and talked to police men again. Some were subdued in their response. RAF people took sadbhav mission patrika with interest. I was bit surprised that among several hundred of policemen I could notice only two Muslims. I wanted to find out the status of those detained, but no one seemed to know. Residents also did not raise this issue.
I wanted to visit friends in the area but roza aaftar and namaaz had begun, hence I left for IIT. At 9 PM I talked to them on phone. They confirmed my impressions. I am happy that better sense of overwhelming majority prevailed upon rash youth. Elderly and responsible people played a very constructive role and contained a major conflagration from developing. Police and administration also showed restraint.
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Gandhian Dr. V. K. Tripathi is Professor of Physics at IIT, Delhi