Bharatpur, Rajasthan: Sajida is unable to move anymore. Her face is swollen from all the crying. Women keep fanning and comforting her. They cover her face with a dupatta. The mother of six wakes up when someone mentions Junaid, but is too feeble to answer. Her six-month daughter, meanwhile, taps on the photo of her father on a mobile.
A few meters away, Nasir’s wife is lying motionless on the floor of their house in Ghatmeeka, a Muslim dominated tiny village nestled in Rajasthan’s Bharatpur district. Both women have no clue how their husbands died and why they were killed. The completely charred bodies, which are reduced to bones, haven’t been buried till Friday afternoon.
Local villagers and in and around the area gathered at Nasir’s house Friday demanding justice for the two men. “Is it a crime to be a Muslim in this country now? Even if they did something or not, that is for the police and the law to see. Without any proof, they were killed like this,” Junaid’s cousin Ismail asked. “Who will look after their children and wives now? How will we send our boys outside?”
Fear pervades among the villagers, as they don’t want to open up about what exactly transpired. “You people (media) come and go. These gau rakshaks (cow vigilantes) then wait for us to step out and kill us,” another local resident Jakir said.
The tightly knit village with only one school, is dominated by lower-middle class families. “There is nothing much to do here. The first batch of class 12 passed from here in 2019. Men sustain themselves through driving cars, deliveries, etc,” a local resident, who retired as a teacher, said.
On Thursday morning around 8 am, two bodies were found in a SUV in Haryana’s Bhiwani district, hours after Ismail lodged an FIR at Gopalgarh police station that the two men had gone missing and were allegedly kidnapped by members of the Bajrang Dal.
One of the accused, Rinku Saini from Ferozepur Jhirka, was arrested in connection with the case, the Rajasthan Police said in an official press note issued Friday late evening. Saini, 32, drives taxi and catches those smuggling cows, it added.
While families and villagers say that the bodies belong to Junaid and Nasir and that gau rakshaks murdered the duo, the police await scientific evidence to establish their identities and also to ascertain if they were murdered.
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What FIR mentions
In the FIR lodged on the basis of Ismail’s complaint, five men including Mohit Yadav alias Monu Maneswar were named. He had earlier claimed that cow smugglers had threatened him.
Monu, who identifies himself as a gau rakshak, joined the Bajrang Dal in 2011. His name figured in another police complaint on 28 January in Haryana’s Nuh district, after an injured Waris Khan handed over to the police on the suspicion of cow smuggling died in a hospital. In the Nuh case, police claimed that the injuries were sustained in an accident.
Anil, a resident of Multhan; Shrikant, resident of Maroda; Lokesh Singla, resident of Hoda and Saini are the four other accused.
“The family members of the two men informed the Gopalgarh police Thursday that they have been abducted and that their phones are switched off. The two men had left their homes Wednesday night in a Bolero SUV. An FIR was registered. Later the bodies of two men were found at Loharu in Haryana’s Bhiwani district,” Bharatpur Inspector General Gaurav Srivastava told ThePrint.
Sources in the Rajasthan Police told ThePrint that Saini was arrested after being interrogated. “There are several others whose names have cropped up during the investigation,” a senior police officer said.
While Junaid has five previous cases of cow smuggling, Nasir had no such criminal record, police said.
Asked where the two Muslim men were heading, one of the sources said, “they had set out Tuesday night, in the Bolero of one of their cousins. Prima facie, it doesn’t appear that they were smuggling cows because no trucks, cows have surfaced during the probe yet. Further investigation is on.”
The FIR mentions that around 5 am Wednesday, Junaid and Nasir had gone in the Bolero for some work. The complainant, Ismail, was drinking tea when a stranger informed him that two men were badly beaten up by 8-10 men and were then abducted by the assaulters.
Upon inquiring, the people at the spot told Ismail that Anil, Shrikant, Saini, Singla and Monu were from the Bajrang Dal.
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Duo had stepped out without informing kin
ThePrint learnt that Junaid and Nasir had stepped out Tuesday night without divulging their whereabouts to the two families.
“They didn’t return home the entire night and their phones were switched off. We were very worried and started looking for them. Then someone, identifying as the sarpanch, from Ferozepur Jhirka called a family member and informed us that Junaid and Nasir were beaten up badly by some 8-10 members and then taken to Ferozepur Jhirka police who told them that they must take the men away as they are in serious condition,” Ismail told ThePrint.
“The police asked them (attackers) where they got the men from, the group replied that they were from Rajasthan and then the Haryana police asked them to take them back saying it’s not their jurisdiction. We went to the police chowki but they didn’t let us enter saying the men weren’t there. We were then told by some residents to register an FIR in Gopalgarh police station.”
The names of the five accused were handed to villagers by the sarpanch who got the list by Firozpur police, he said.
According to Ismail, the family kept looking for Junaid and Nasir all through Wednesday and after nothing was traced in Ferozepur Jhirka, they reached Gopalgarh police station to lodge the FIR. Hours later, they received a call after the Bolero was identified.
Sources in the Rajasthan police didn’t deny this theory. “We are aware of this, but investigation is on so we cannot confirm anything yet. In all likelihood, the family members must have gone to Ferozepur Jhirka after they got the call to enquire about the two men…which also means that they must have received some information. This also explains their delay in approaching the Gopalgarh police,” one of the sources said.
“When the police sent them (attackers) away citing serious conditions, the accused burnt their bodies in Bhiwani,” Ismail said.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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