Muslim residents of Atali village in Ballabgarh, Faridabad, have fled for their life, abandoning their homes, which have been torched, along with their mosques, in an attack by India Hindu Jat community earlier this week.
“We had just begun praying when the attacks started. They came in groups of 10 and attacked each house,” Isal, a showroom owner, located directly opposite the under-construction mosque, told Indian Express on Wednesday, May 27.
“Bricks and gas cylinders were thrown, hurled inside the houses. They attacked us with baseball bats and sticks. We tried to escape by locking ourselves inside our homes.
“That was when they started dousing our homes with petrol and setting them on fire,” he added.
The violence erupted last Monday evening when Muslims were praying Maghreb, or evening prayer.
The dispute is apparently related to the construction of a new mosque that was frozen over the past six years.
Though Muslims confirmed that the court had given them permission to resume construction, Hindu Jats maintained that resuming the construction of mosque in the village was in clear violation of the court’s order.
The attack left the mosque burnt along with all 17 houses owned by Muslims in the area surrounding the mosque.
Only one shop was burnt in the lane beside the mosque, in an attack apparently targeting its Muslim owner.
The evidence of the hasty Muslim exodus from the village appeared everywhere, leaving their doors open, fans running and belongings abandoned.
No Homes
Turning homeless, angry Muslim residents protested on Tuesday, accusing the police of inefficiency in investigating the matter and gross negligence.
“Police have done nothing. Even 36 hours after the violence, they have not made a single arrest,” Sahil Ahmed, a protester, said.
“They are giving time to those who have made us homeless to bury evidence and get away with it,” he added.
One of the Muslim residents suffered severe burns on both his hands.
The man, Buddhan Khan, said that a group of men bound his hands, doused them in petrol and set them on fire.
“I remember watching my hands light up. And then I remember the pain. It was unbearable. They bound me, stopped me from moving while I watched my hands burn. They told me that it was punishment for wanting to build a mosque on their land,” Khan, who kept slipping in and out of consciousness, said.
He said he managed to escape from his attackers when some Muslim youths turned up at the mosque.
“I ran towards a nearby pool and I submerged my hands in water. By then, police had started arriving and the violence was subsiding,” he said.
Police arrived at the village after the rioting was over, using mild force to disperse attackers.
“The injured people were sent to the civil hospital in a bus. A number of Jat villagers had also sustained injuries and they were also sent to the hospital,” an officer said.
Police sources said the process of lodging complaints has begun.
“Currently, we are taking down complaints that are being lodged. We are also identifying the houses that have been burnt, locating their owners and calculating the extent of loss,” the officer said.
There are some 180 million Muslims in Hindu-majority India, making up 13 percent of the country’s population. Christians make up less than 3 percent
At least three Muslims were killed and several injured as Hindu mobs attacked a Muslim-majority village in India’s Bihar last January.
In Utter Pradesh, dozens were killed in the Hindu-Muslim clashes in 2013 in Muzaffarnagar.
The riots resulted in the death of at least 60 and forced some 70,000 Muslims to flee their villages, according to the state government.
Source: OnIslam
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