By Pervez Bari, TwoCircles.net,
Bhopal: Uneasy calm prevailed in curfew-bound Indore, the financial capital of central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, on Saturday as the total death toll in the communal riots following the “Bharat Bandh” (All India shutdown) call given by Hindu fundamentalist outfits on Thursday has risen to seven with two more deaths reported on Friday.
Two persons were killed and seven injured as fresh communal violence rocked a number of areas on Friday taking the death toll to six in two days of clashes between the two communities in Indore. Four people were killed on Thursday as the shutdown called by the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, (BJP), and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, (VHP), took a communal turn. One trader had immolated himself to death in Satna town of the state on Thursday during the shutdown.
Five additional companies of police force have been summoned in Indore to strengthen the hands of law enforcing agencies in the city.
The Indore district administration on Saturday relaxed curfew for three hours in the evening from 4 to 7 pm with no untoward incident being reported during the relaxation. The curfew was relaxed in 11 of 27 police station areas of the city.
The Madhya Pradesh unit of CPI formed a human chain in Bhopal on Saturday for maintaining peace and communal harmony. The party has appealed the people for maintaining peace and brotherhood in the State.
A high-alert has been sounded in Bhopal which also witnessed incidents of arson and violence but luckily no life was lost.
According to a Indore resident Dawood Hanfi sudden pelting of stones took place at Sadar Bazar on Friday morning. Two persons Rizwan Ahmed (17), Zeeshan Ahmed (18) and a woman, yet to be identified, were killed in police firing. The police directly fired bullets in chest, he said.
The call for the shutdown was given in protest of Jammu and Kashmir government’s decision to cancel the allotment of forest land to the Amarnath shrine board. They were protesting against the government of Indian Kashmir for reversing a decision to transfer forest land to a shrine trust in the Muslim-majority part of the state.
The government was forced to back down after Muslim protesters shut down Kashmir last week over the transfer of land, a move that has angered thousands of Hindus in India.
Meanwhile, more than 200 people have been arrested for arson and violence even as house searches continued in the curfew-bound Indore city, where tension prevailed despite official claim about improvement in the situation today.
According to Indore Collector Rakesh Chaudhury criminal cases have been registered against three police personnel in connection with death of two people in Khajarana area in Indore during violence on Thursday.
Meanwhile, Madhya Pradesh Congress Committee, (MPCC), president Suresh Pachauri has demanded a judicial probe into the violence that occurred during the BJP-VHP sponsored Bharat Bandh.
Addressing a Press conference after returning from violence hit Indore, Pachauri said that the police and the rioters appeared to be hand in glove with each other in the entire Madhya Pradesh during the bandh on Thursday.
Asserting if the district administration had remained vigilant these incidents could have been avoided, Pachauri said that the police not only remained a mute spectator and allowed the rioters to do whatever they liked but at many places, like in Satna, itself participated in the torture of those who were victimised.
While this clearly showed that the violence was Government-sponsored, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s statement further lends credence to our suspicion. Chouhan, according to Pachauri, had said, “It (violence) was bound to happen after what the Jammu and Kashmir Government did”.
Replying to a question Pachauri said that the Governor Dr. Balram Jakhar should recommend imposition of President’s rule, if he feels so, in view of the deteriorating law and order situation in the State and the BJP Government’s failure to check it.
“The law and order situation in the State is going from bad to worse. We have submitted a memorandum to the Governor urging him to utilise his powers and also issue directives to the State Government to take proper action so that violence was checked and the situation was not allowed to further go beyond control,” Pachauri said.
The MPCC staged a day-long dharna here to protest the widespread violence in the State during Thursday’s VHP-BJP sponsored Bharat Bandh.
Meanwhile, Madhya Pradesh Bhartiya Muslim Sangh, (MPBMS), has held Congress equally responsible for the violence that erupted in the State during the bandh.
Charging further the political parties for harming the communal harmony, the MPBMS demanded strict actions against the guilty. The ones responsible for loss of lives in Indore should be booked under the charges of murder.
Similarly, the CPI(M) also criticised the violence and stated that the way things occurred in the State confirms that minority communities are not at all safe in the State and immediately Army should be deployed in the affected areas.
Ms Uma Bharti’s Bharatiya Jan Shakti party also strongly condemned the violence that was reported in Indore where innocent persons lost their lives. The party maintained that the State Government and administration is completely responsible for this.
According to a Press release of the party, if normalcy is not resorted in Indore by July 6 then Ms Uma Bharti will demonstrate and expose the ones who are responsible for such acts. ([email protected])