Malda/Murshidabad: The assault began with crude bombs hurled at homes and then came the death threats. As residents fled in fear, looters swept in, stripping houses of valuables, even livestock. Eventually, LPG cylinders were unhooked from kitchen ovens, triggering gas leaks, which led to explosions, reducing buildings to rubble.
Betbona village is among the hardest hit by the communal violence that swept through parts of West Bengal’s Murshidabad district last Friday and Saturday during protests against the new waqf law.
The village now bears the scars of what residents term “a meticulously coordinated attack”.
Nearly 450 Hindu residents of the village have since fled, crossing the Ganga in boats with the help of Border Security Force (BSF) personnel, seeking refuge later in a relief camp in the neighbouring Malda district.
“They ordered us to take off our tulsi malas (basil rosaries) and look like Muslims,” Minati Mandal, a resident of Betbona village, told ThePrint. “We pleaded that we are Hindus, but they threatened to behead us. They took all my jewellery and Rs 1.5 lakh cash.”
In Murshidabad, several Muslim-majority villages surround Betbona, whose residents allege that the attackers arrived from those villages. Muslims accounted for 66.27 percent of the population in Murshidabad in the 2011 Census.
By Wednesday, the Murshidabad village, largely deserted and under the watch of security forces, resembled a battle zone. Signs of destruction were everywhere—from charred walls and soot-covered floors to mangled ceiling fans and kitchen utensils scattered across courtyards—testimonies to the attack.
Across the Ganga, at Parlalpur High School, where the Betbona residents replaced by the Murshidabad village have taken shelter, RSS swayamsevak Bidhan Mandal is among the many members of the Sangh and its affiliates to have arrived to volunteer as relief workers.
“Hindus are homeless in Hindustan under the watch of Mamata Banerjee,” Mandal says, referring to the West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress leader.
According to him, the Waqf issue is just a pretext to target Hindus.
After a pause, he adds: “Look, our poet, Kazi Nazrul Islam, once wrote, ‘Mora ek-i brinte duti kusum, Hindu Musalman, Muslim tahar nayan mani, Hindu tahar pran (Hindus and Muslims are two buds on one stalk. The Muslim is the apple of its eye, the Hindu is its soul)’. But only Hindus still believe in that. Muslims do not.”
Besides the RSS, organisations such as the Ramakrishna Mission and the Bharat Sevashram Sangha are conducting relief efforts for the displaced at the camp, where villagers get meals thrice a day from a makeshift kitchen.
“Our children are at least getting adequate food here. Even milk is available. The administration wants us to go back. But what do we return to? The attackers destroyed even our harvest and burnt down our houses,” laments Lipika Ghosh, who, along with four of her family members, has sought shelter at the school.
Among those displaced is Saptami Mandal, forced to flee the Murshidabad violence with her seven-day-old infant. Her uncle, Sudarshan Mandal, recounts how she had just returned home from the hospital when the Murshidabad violence began, and attackers arrived at their doorstep.
“We somehow escaped when the attacks started. On the road, we came across BSF personnel and asked for help. They asked if we had relatives across the river. That is when we called our family members in Parlalpur and asked them to send boats. Eventually, we made it to the camp,” he says.
Betbona village is close to Jafrabad, where the attackers hacked to death Haragovind Das (70) and his son Chandan Das (40) during the violence. On the other hand, Ezaj Ahmed, who was among two persons injured allegedly in police firing in Suti, died Saturday.
The police, on Tuesday, arrested Kalu Nadar and Dildar Nadar in connection with the killings of the father-son duo in the Murshidabad violence. The accused lived in the same Jafrabad area where the Das family is.
Police arrested Kalu Nadar from Murarai in Birbhum district and nabbed his brother Dildar near the India-Bangladesh border in Suti, Murshidabad.
So far, the police have arrested 221 people in connection with communal disturbance, according to the state police.
‘We want a BSF camp in our village’
At the relief camp in Malda’s Parlalpur, local officials are urging the displaced to return to Betbona village, promising they will provide security to the villagers.
“If you do not return, what will happen to your farmlands? Your cattle? How long will you stay here? Go talk to your neighbours and reach a decision,” a senior police officer tells a group of villagers gathered at the school entrance.
However, an apparent breakdown in the villagers’ trust in the state administrative apparatus has become an obstacle.
“We want a BSF camp in our village. We need that assurance. We are not going back to die there without that support. Where were the police when the attackers went on a rampage [in Murshidabad] on Friday and Saturday? It was only when the BSF came that we got rescued,” says Samar Kar Mallick, a Betbona resident.
Political leaders have also begun making their way to the relief camp for the Murshidabad violence-affected.
On Tuesday, Isha Khan Choudhury, a Congressman and Member of Parliament from Malda Dakshin—the constituency in which the Betbona village falls—attempted to meet the displaced at Parlalpur High School but failed.
Local police barred politicians and journalists from entering the makeshift camp, citing a lack of permission from the higher authorities. The move led to a brief scuffle between the officers and the villagers insisting on the entry of media persons.
Choudhury later blamed “vested interests” for blocking his entry.
On Wednesday, Banerjee, addressing a meeting of imams in Kolkata, claimed the violence was “pre-planned”. A section of the BSF, central agencies, and the Bharatiya Janata Party colluded to fan tension by facilitating cross-border influx from Bangladesh, she alleged.
However, her remarks did not cut much ice with the locals, who are holding her responsible for the law apparatus failing to anticipate and prevent the arson attacks. Among the displaced, the running refrain is: “Mamata’s police looked the other way as the attackers carried out acts of destruction and loot. The BSF saved us.”
The Calcutta High Court had ordered the deployment of personnel from the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF), along with state police, in the region. As the West Bengal Police and CAPF personnel patrol the streets, the area remains on the edge.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
Also Read: West Bengal’s Waqf violence will have no winner. Don’t stoke flames that can consume you
Aren’t you the same fraud journalist who wrote in an earlier article that Ejaz was killed by unknown forces and insinuated that he was a victim? Have you apologised for that? Here you write fellow was killed by police firing. Meaning, he was there and involved in rioting and if he is dead, that’s ok him. Not on the Hindus.
Stop projecting muslims as victims in Bengal. they aren’t. They are mamata’s pets. They unleash terror and have been doing so in murshidabad and malda belt for years now. Say it like it is. Don’t hide behind the garb of secularism. And while you are at it, hold mamata responsible. She is home minister of the state. If attacks are pre planned, she should have had some intel. If she didn’t, shows she is a failure.