By Ilyaskhan Pathan, for TwoCircles.net,
Ahmedabad: Nearly 300 people were arrested while agitating against the construction of Swaminarayan temple on Wednesday in Damnagar city of Amreli, Gujarat.
The agitation began when the local municipal authority allowed the construction of Swaminarayan temple on the 30 thousand sq.ft of graveyard land sold to Purshottam Sanstha at Rs.18 lacs by the district collector in 2002 against which Muslims went to the local court.
The issue was later resolved in the year 2006 but Muslims whose relatives are buried on that land did not agree with the solution and went to the court again.
Ironically while the matter is still in the court local Municipal authority allowed the construction on the temple on the disputed land and hence the infighting among the community began. When the situation worsened, section 144 was implemented and the construction of compound wall began under Police protection.
When nearly 500 Muslims agitated, Police lathi charged them and arrested nearly 300 people. Damnagar PSI K S Titya has arrested 93 local Muslims for the violation of section 144.
Muslim leaders wrote a letter to the District police commissioner for the investigation against the arrest.
TCN has learnt that the issue is disputed since 1977 and hence the construction was not allowed since then.