By Manzar Imam for TwoCircles.net
Dingarheri (Tauru/Nuh): The mood in Dingarheri village, surrounded by green fields and looking greener after heavy rains, is gloomy. Hundreds of people from dozens of nearby villages under Tauru police station in the newly-carved Nuh district of Haryana are gathered in front of the two small one-room houses of the 65-year-old Zahuruddin, whose family lost all during the terrible night of 24-25 August 2016.
The injured in a Nuh hospital
That night, about half a dozen men entered the room where Zahur’s son Ibrahim and his wife Raseedan were sleeping. They tied Ibrahim (40) and Raseedan (36), took all their belongings and then mercilessly beat them to death with sticks, rods and knives.
Hearing their cries, Zahur’s son-in-law Zafaruddin and his wife, sleeping a few meters away on the charpoys in the open, rushed to the room. Both of them were thrashed severely. Zafar is in a critical condition, and has been been shifted to the Trauma Centre of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi.
Zafar’s three children, besides his elder brother’s 12-year-old daughter slept in another room. The children–two of them girls –between the age 10 and 19 were not only beaten and stabbed but are also repeatedly gangraped. One of the children called out grandfather Zahuruddin after the perpetrators left.
Spot of the crime
The news of the ghastly incident spread by the morning and people from the surrounding villages of Nuh and other districts of Mewat throng the spot of the crime, shell-shocked.
But the news remains unreported in the so-called national media even after four days. Although a few Hindi dailies reported the incident in their regional additions, the city-centric news television channels remain oblivious.
Zahur’s nephew Arif says that electronic media has been avoiding to cover the incident for reasons he does not know.
Maulana Mohammad Asrarul Haque Qasmi, Member of Parliament from Kishanganj Lok Sabha Constituency of Bihar visited the village on 28 August to take stock of the situation after being approached by dozens of residents of different places of the Mewat region.
The MP, while urging people to stand for justice for the grieved family, said that the incident was not with any particular family or community but with humanity itself.
MP, Maulana Asrarul Hque Qasmi talking to Zahuruddin
“The only thing I demand”, said a distressed Haque “is that justice should be done”. Haque commended the people of Haryana in general and of the Mewat region in particular for their simplicity, humble and humanistic attitude and peaceful living. He said that the anguished faces of the people of all communities gathered were an assertion of their hope and faith in the Indian democracy and the law of the land.
Maulana Hakimuddin Ashraf Utawari, General Secretary of Jamiat Ulama, District Gurgaon and Mewat, said, “Whoever has committed this inhuman crime should be given strongest punishment.” It is important to point out that in April this year, a 15-year-old girl was gangraped and murdered in the same region.
While interacting with the people, this correspondent came to know that the Haryana Government has so far given no compensation to any of the victims, which is shocking. The Haryana Waqf Board, however, has announced that it will give Rs 1 lakh each to the family of the dead and Rs 50,000 each to those seriously injured.
Zafaruddin, one of the critically injured has been shifted to the Trauma Centre of AIIMS, New Delhi, while three others, who were also badly injured, are being treated in a city hospital in Nuh.
It is surprising as to why the injured victims who could help identify the culprits are not being shifted to either AIIMS or Medanta or any other major hospital in New Delhi or Gurgaon, both of which falling within the 80-90 km radius of Tauru. However, it is important to also point while filing report, this correspondent received the news that four persons allegedly involved in the Dingarheri dual murder and gangrape have been arrested.
However, despite the arrests made, the ugliness and intensity of the crime has sent shock waves throughout the region. The brutal manner with which the murder and rape have been executed makes one shudder. Anger and fear were writ large on people’s faces. Pradeep Singh Zaildar, General Secretary of Haryana Pradesh Congress called the dual murder and gangrape “bigger than the Nirbhaya case”. Once the perpetrators are identified, they should be tried under the fast track court, demands Zaildar.
MP, Maulana Asrarul Haque Qasmi addressing the people at Dingarheri
This incident also raises serious questions especially about the role of the electronic media in raising the voices of the poor and the wronged.
The impunity with which serious crimes like rape and murder are being committed in Haryana or elsewhere makes us all pose and think about the so-called vigilant police and state administrations’ tall claims of a crime free nation where women enjoy as much liberty as men do.
The author is a freelance journalist based in New Delhi