“After very long, we ate in peace. We are worried about all that we have lost but Eid is not the day to think about it,” said 65-year-old Sartaz Bibi Khan who lived in the lane in Gujarat's Himmatnagar where communal clashes broke out during Ram Navami processions on 10 April.
A fortnight after the clashes broke out, an “anti-encroachment drive” was carried out in the area on 26 April. This is similar to the pattern of demolition following communal violence that has been seen in Delhi’s Jahangirpuri and Madhya Pradesh’s Khargone lately.
A two-storeyed building that housed four shops, a makeshift home of an elderly couple, and a few kiosks were removed by the local civic body to make way for the ongoing TP Road project.
The TP Road project is a 15-metre-long project that has been going on for the last four years. As per the chief municipal officer, Navneet Patel, the civic body had already acquired 12 metre for the 15-metre project and the anti-encroachment drive was conducted in the remaining 3-metre area.
While Patel told The Quint that since June 2019, several notices have been sent to encroachers, the timing is suspicious – with the drive taking place days after the Ram Navami communal clash.
In October 2021, the local civic body had dismantled a clothing shop in the area that belonged to Sartaz and her 70-year-old husband Ayub Khan. Then, on 26 April this year, they also lost the shanty they had put in place where they lived.
“The civic body did not use a bulldozer on our shanty, perhaps due to our age. They dismantled it and gave us parts that can be used to build a roof later,” said Ayub.
Ever since their shop was demolished to make way for the TP Road, the couple has been jobless. “Four days before the demolition in April, we set up a tailoring unit, two chairs and a shop. This is our way of earning enough money to buy food. We have lived here for three generations now,” said Sartaz.
The couple believes that the anti-encroachment drive “has nothing to do with the communal clash that took place. It was because of TP Road, and it has caused us great inconvenience. There is no one to look after us.”
But many others don't agree.
Forty-year-old Jamaluddin Sayyed, a tailor who set up his work there in early 2000s and whose shop, too, was razed to the ground, said, “I had two shops in the building and was paying Rs 2,000 rent. On 25 April, we got a notice that the shop is encroaching and will be demolished the next day. Just like that, bulldozers came in and razed it. I lost everything. Under the guise of an anti-encroachment drive, they are trying to intimidate Muslims after the Ram Navami violence.”
Sayyed claimed that six months ago, an employee of the civic body had assured him that his shop will not face any demolition. “Two weeks after the communal violence here, they told me my property is encroaching the land. Suddenly, the TP Road project is the most urgent matter,” said Sayyed.
A Peaceful Eid in Himmatnagar
On 2 May, the area councillor, Superintendent of Police Vishal Vaghela, other senior police officers, and representatives of both communities, met to discuss the security protocols to be followed on Eid the next day to ensure peaceful celebrations.
On Eid, the lane, where the communal violence and the following demolition took place, saw heavy police deployment. Even as Sartaz shares how she feels safe due to police deployment, Sayyed has stored all the things that were kept at his shop at home now.
“There’s tension, of course. I have lost my shops, my only source of income but today is Eid and the lane has come alive again for the first time since the violence took place on 10 April,” said Sayyed.
What happened on 10 April?
For years, Ashraf Nagar – a Muslim dominated area in Chhapariya in Gujarat’s Himmatnagar – barely 80 km away from Ahmedabad – has observed all festivals peacefully. This year, however, things changed after a clash broke during a Ram Navami procession last month.
“Until last year, we used to set up stalls of sharbat, snacks and water to welcome the members of Hindu processions. This year, an oversight on the part of authorities resulted in clashes,” said Imran Anjiwala, the leader of opposition in Himmatnagar municipality.
Around 12.40 pm on 10 April, a socio-religious organisation – Antarashtriya Hindu Parishad (AHP) – carried out a religious procession on Ram Navami through the area.
They had police permission and a small number of police personnel were deployed while the rally was going on, according to the reply received by Govind Parmar – an advocate who has worked with the victims of Naroda Patiya post 2002 Gujarat riots – from the sub-divisional magistrate. Parmar is working with the member of the Muslim community to gather evidence about what happened on 10 April.
Himmatnagar is the biggest taluka of the Sabarkantha district in Gujarat – with a population of 81,137, as per the 2011 census. A Hindu-dominated town, Muslims form 21 percent of the population.
Around 1.40 pm, according to eyewitnesses, a Muslim man, identified as Ashfaq Khan was allegedly gesturing to three teenaged girls to go inside their house.
An eyewitness named Mahmood Usman Qadri, also known as Manzil Bhai, 60, said, “The man was only trying to gesture the girls to go inside because the procession was going on but this was misunderstood. He was surrounded by men who were a part of the Ram Navami procession who thought he was gesturing at them. There was an argument, and they abused him. He explained, even apologised but no one listened to him. After that, things took a violent turn.”
Two Muslim women, in their 50s, also narrated the same sequence of events. An FIR has been filed against Ashfaq, and he is currently absconding, said a police source.
The police have registered the FIR under section 307 (attempt to murder), along with other sections of the IPC, after receiving a complaint from a sub-inspector of the Himmatnagar police station, who claimed that Ashfaq threw stones at him and injured him.
An FIR has also been filed against AHP and VHP in connection to the violence on 10 April as per a police source. At least two dozen people were left injured in the violence, including 10 police personnel.
Dargahs, Houses Burnt
Leader of Opposition Imran Anjiwala alleged that “miscreants burnt two religious places of Muslims in the area.” At Ashraf Nagar, The Quint found that two dargahs were partially burned, along with two houses. The doors of one of the dargahs in Chhaparia, barely a metre away from the place of communal clash, could still be seen partially burnt.
One of the houses belongs to 36-year-old Yasmin. Her father Mehmud recounted, “The members of AHP were throwing stones which hurt my 17-year-old son. He had to be rushed to the hospital in Ahmedabad."
- 01/03
Yasmin Mehmud (36) with the photos of all that was burnt — cooler, chair, refrigerator. She also found 5 gallon of gasoline in her house which was used to burn the house.
(Photo: Ashvita Singh/The Quint)
- 02/03
A closer look at the photo of the house which was attacked on 10 April.
(Photo: Ashvita Singh/The Quint)
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The now abandoned house, next to Yasmin's, was also gutted.
(Photo: Ashvita Singh/The Quint)
"After that, my daughter locked the house and escaped from the backdoor with her two children, aged seven and nine. When the stone pelters found the house empty, they burnt the house using gasoline,” he added.
The house next to Yasmin’s was also burnt down.
“The miscreants ran away. Nobody knows where or who they were,” Mehumd said, adding that when they returned home, they found five gallons of gasoline.
“Police came and took the gasoline. They did not do anything else,” Yasmin said.
Meanwhile, Anjiwala claimed, “They removed our religious flag from the masjid in Akbar Nagar Kasba in the Chhaparia area and put a saffron flag.”
Anjiwala alleged that members of the procession chanted “Jai Shri Ram” as the saffron flag was being placed on the mosque, claiming that it was “evident from the police inaction whose side they were on.”
Police Inaction
Several stakeholders in the incident have questioned the role of Himmatnagar’s Superintendent of Police (SP) Vishal Vaghela, who took charge on 2 April. One among them is the area’s BJP unit chief Jayesh Patel.
“Days after he took charge, a riot broke out. He did not even have contact details of appropriate officials who could guide him. His delay in acting intensified the situation,” Jayesh Patel told The Quint.
He claimed that it took four hours for the anti-riot squad to arrive in the area.
Two Muslim women who own shops in the lane where the clashes took place on 10 April claimed that “participants of the procession made lewd remarks at the women in front of police personnel".
One of these two women, on condition of anonymity, told The Quint, “SP Vaghela was there when the men made such comments.” She also claimed that police personnel “pelted stones at members of the Muslim community".
A purported video too surfaced online in which SP Vaghela can be seen wearing anti-riot gear while some police personnel pelted stones at people while he stood attempting to manage a situation that was clearly going out of hand. The Quint reached out to SP Vaghela regarding the purported video, to which he replied, “no comments,” and hung up.
Gujarat BJP’s chief spokesperson Yamal Vyas when asked if the state government was aware of any ongoing investigation in this matter, he said, “This is a very local issue and the local authorities are responsible for taking care of the law and order situation in the area. Any and every perpetrator of the violence that happened on 10 April should face the consequences as defined by the Indian law – irrespective of their religion or community.”
As per the police, 25 people have been arrested so far of which 12 have been booked under Section 307 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The Second Procession
Merely hours after the first bout of violence on 10 April, another religious procession was carried out by Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) in the same area around 4 pm.
VHP Chief Rajubhai Malvia was present at the site, as per Dr Sarfaraz Shaikh, a doctor working in the area and an eyewitness of the incident. "More damage was done in the evening violence, there was stone pelting, dargahs were damaged, houses," claimed Shaikh.
Residents and eyewitnesses from Chhapariya said that SP Vaghela came to the site only at 4 pm.
Govind Parmar, an advocate who has worked with the victims of Naroda Patiya post 2002 Gujarat riots, visited the area a few days after the incident in the fact-finding capacity along with the members of Jamaat.
In conversation with The Quint, Parmar stated that the biggest and the most striking oversight on the part of police administration was allowing the VHP to continue with their rally at 4 pm on April 10.
“Even though both the rallies had prior police permission, the administration could have easily revoked the VHP’s rally permission given the violence that took place in the afternoon,” he said.
(Ashvita Singh is an independent journalist based in Ahmedabad.)
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