By Faisal Fareed, TwoCircles.net,
Lucknow: A petty fight led to violent clashes between two communities in Agra on Tuesday. The incident occurred in the Mantola locality of the Taj city. Firing, arson, stone pelting occurred during the 45 minute incident. A police bike was torched while one house, a small factory and few scooters were also consigned to flames.
As per reports, the incident occurred at around 8:30 am on Tuesday when Farhan, son of Balo, a resident of Mundapada and Akbar, son of Abdul Waheed reached veterinary hospital in Tila Nandram locality for the treatment of their goat. While they were standing outside the veterinary hospital a bike borne youth had an accident with their goat.
The bike rider was identified as Basant, son of Shivcharan, whose house is opposite the hospital. Both the sides started having heated arguments over the accident. The verbal duel soon changed into scuffle and later snowballed into a free for all situations. As the warring factions belonged to two different communities, hundreds of people joined taking side of their communities. Soon, the scene changed into a battle field with both sides indulging in stone pelting each other.
The house of Shivcharan was looted and torched by the rioters. Later, police force from whole Agra district was galvanized which took recourse to tear gases and firing to control the mob.
Later, in the evening a peace committee meeting was also held between the two communities but it failed to diffuse the situation. Presently, heavy police force has been deputed in the region and situation is reported to be tense. DIG Assem Arun however maintained that only rubber bullets were fired.