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HomeIndiaRiot-hit Khargone counts its losses, a torched PMAY house, broken dreams &...

Riot-hit Khargone counts its losses, a torched PMAY house, broken dreams & dead animals

Lanes of Khargone’s communally hypersensitive, riot-affected areas are covered with bricks, glasses & tiles, charred bangles, food grains, clothes, & other remains from burnt shops & houses.

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Khargone: Aisha Khan — a survivor of the communal riots that rocked Madhya Pradesh’s Khargone district last Sunday — holds the burnt pages of the Quran, standing near the door of the bedroom, weeping. She has lost everything in the riots — her house, savings, jewellery worth Rs 1,50,000 for her daughter’s wedding and is now struggling for basic amenities like food and water. Her burnt house is scattered with grains, burnt utensils, currency notes — that she had saved for her daughter Muskaan’s wedding. Seven of them live together, including her grandson.

When the riots broke out, during the Ram Navami procession in Talab Chowk, Aisha’s family was just done with Iftaar. She heard some loud noises outside her house like boulders were falling from a height, when she went out, she saw a mob of around 300.

Aisha Khan flips through the burnt pages of the Quran. | Photo: Bismee Taskin | ThePrint
Aisha Khan flips through the burnt pages of the Quran. | Photo: Bismee Taskin | ThePrint

She tried to reason with the mob — “there are no rioters here, please leave us alone,” but nobody listened. She hurried inside, bolted the door, and left the house with her husband and her ill father-in-law. The next morning, she was informed by the neighbours that her house was burnt down and she was robbed.

“They all carried weapons and wore masks. Now, I have no shelter. My sons earn Rs 5,000-6,000 — working as a cleaner at hospitals and factories,” she said.


Also Read: ‘Message to rioters’ or ‘anti-encroachment drive’ — what exactly happened in Khargone after riot


Witness to four riots 

This is the second riot that Aisha and many others have witnessed in the past six months. Khargone is a communally hypersensitive area and has witnessed riots in the past as well. The first reported riots took place in 1921, followed by several others. The worst included the ones which took place in 1989 during the Ram Shila programme, one during Dussehra in 2015, 2021 Mila-un-Nabi and the one that took place in September 2021. Many of them have had enough and want to sell off their ancestral homes and relocate.

About 500 metres from their houses, is Pannalal Chandore’s house. The family of 11, including four children, have been living in Sanjay Nagar for the last five decades. “I have seen four riots, — 1989, 2015 and in September last year. They blasted a cylinder in our house,” he said, picking up the Shivling idol from the ground, showing how they destroyed their worship area.

Pannalal Chandore holds a burnt shivling, asking how many more riots will he have to witness. | Photo: Bismee Taskin | ThePrint
Pannalal Chandore holds a burnt shivling, asking how many more riots will he have to witness. | Photo: Bismee Taskin | ThePrint

Many in Sanjay Nagar, including Chandore, have written “Ye makaan bikau hai (this house is for sale)”. “We have had enough”. In Jhamidaar mohalla, near Ganesh chowk, several others have also put their houses up for sale.

Lanes of Khargone’s most riot-affected areas are covered with bricks, glasses and tiles, charred bangles, food grains, and clothes.

At least 26 homes, a dozen vehicles, at least six shops, one godown, and several religious places were either vandalised or set on fire, police said. The communal clashes left over 30 injured, including the town inspector, BI Mandloi, former superintendent of police, Siddhart Choudhary and 16-year-old Shivam Shukla.

DSP Amit Jaisal told ThePrint Saturday that a total of 44 FIRs have been lodged and 148 have been arrested so far.

High level sources in MP police also told ThePrint Saturday, that out of the total 148 arrested so far, six are Hindus who were arrested for allegedly attacking a Muslim family Tuesday night in Kukdol, 8 kms from Khargone city.

“They have been arrested on the basis of CCTV footage and FIRs registered. The investigation is on,” a source said.


Also Read: ‘Stone-pelters will be greeted with bulldozer’: BJP defends MP govt action on Khargone riot


Sanjay Nagar worst-hit 

Aisha’s immediate neighbour in Sanjay Nagar, one of the most riot-affected areas, Aqila Bi, had just finished building her house with the money she got from the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna. She too lost everything in the riots, but the most important thing is the patta of the land and her husband’s pension documents.

“It was around 7:00-7:30. My 22-year-old son and I were alone in the house, we didn’t know what to do. We switched off the lights and lay quiet. All of them had weapons. We locked the house and ran out to the nearest masjid,” she said. Aqila Bi lived with her widowed daughter-in-law, Salma, three grandchildren, and her son, who was to get married this year.

The mob not only burnt down her house but also robbed and burnt the Rs 2,00,000 she saved for his wedding. For a living, she begs, and her son drives a mobile eatery. Salma, who lost her husband two years back, now stares at a dark future, helpless. “How will we recover from all this?” she says, wiping her tears, and holding her youngest grandchild’s hand.

Charred currency note in riot-hit Sanjay Nagar. | Photo: Bismee Taskin | ThePrint
Charred currency note in riot-hit Sanjay Nagar. | Photo: Bismee Taskin | ThePrint

Paru Baipati, a daily wage labourer, a neighbour to both Aisha and Aqila, said, “It’s only because we left that we are alive. They will now have to go back to living in rented homes again”.


Also read: From UP to MP, bulldozer is the new buzzword — to instil fear of law and show development


Not even animals were spared

In Tavdi Mohalla, two brothers who have retired from the Khargone police force, stare at the burnt bikes. Retired police head constable Basir Ahmed (2015) and Nasir Ahmed, retired Assistant Sub Inspector (2020) said the rioters entered from the bathroom and the main gate.

“They jumped through the main gate, destroyed our property, and didn’t even spare our goats. Three of them died screaming in pain after they threw petrol bombs,” Nasir said.

Reshma, who lives with her parents, in a house rented from the masjid committee, shows the emptied cupboard. She holds the emptied boxes, unlocks the locker and says, “they also took away all the jewellery and money”.

“I was about to perform namaz when someone told me that a bloodthirsty mob was waiting outside. I went out looking for my brother and passed the night from one mohalla to another for shelter,” Reshma said. The rioters killed her two goats, her only source of income and took away the gas cylinder.

Rajkor Bai, a neighbour of Reshma’s, points at broken tiles that she had bought for the construction of her new house. She said that she was stuck in her old house when some police personnel rescued her. “They broke my bed, and took all the money – Rs 70,000,” she said. She lives with her five sons and a daughter.

“We will be stuck in this tiny house for the rest of our lives,” Rajkor said. Pointing to another house, she said, “Hanif bhai also suffered losses”. Hanif Khan and his two brothers, and their families live together. The sound of the partially damaged clock, fallen on the broken main door of their house, keeps ticking as Hanif’s father Kallu Khan scrambles to find some legal documents.

Cherry-picking to punish rioters 

On ground, when ThePrint asked the riot-affected people, everyone echoed the same answer, “we don’t know who the masked men were”, or “they were thugs with petrol bombs and weapons”.

The state government has set up its first two member claims tribunal under the Madhya Pradesh Damage to public and private property Act, 2021 to recover the damage from the rioters.

Soon after the violence, Khargone district administration started a demolition drive, cherry-picking those areas where maximum rioting had taken place and had “illegal” structures to send those involved in the clash a lesson.

Khargone MLA Ravi Joshi criticised the district administration and the police force, saying, “they couldn’t handle the law and order situation”.

“Instead, they got busy bringing down houses after a riot in a curfew zone,” Joshi said, noting that extra force should have been deployed during the procession itself.

Sequence of events 

On Sunday morning, when the Raghuvanshi community-led Ram Navami procession reached Talab Chowk, they saw the roads had been barricaded, narrowing down their space. Manoj Raghuvanshi, one of the organisers of the rally told ThePrint that there was a heated argument between the police and members of the rally over it. The then SP, Siddharth Choudhary denied this altercation.

“We requested the police to remove the barricades but they weren’t listening and started misbehaving. We needed space to turn — this has been the route always,” BJP district vice-president Shyam Mahajan said.

According to Raghuvanshi, while no incident took place during the rally, this altercation led to the spread of rumours that the police didn’t allow a Hindu procession to take their route because it’s a Muslim locality. “Had this not happened, the riot wouldn’t have taken place,” he said.

BL Mandloi, said that the rally was delayed from 2 pm to 5 pm. “The stone pelting started at Talab chowk. Stone pelting took place from both sides and the mob got violent”. Siddharth Choudhary said police resorted to lathi-charge and tear gas shelling to disperse the crowd, but the situation couldn’t be brought under control until past midnight.

Several eyewitnesses said that the people in the rally were initially requested to lower the sound of the DJ in front of the mosque. A huge crowd had assembled at Talab Chowk, waving saffron flags. Soon after heavy stone-pelting started from what some identified as the terraces behind the mosque. Following this, mayhem broke out in Khargone. Violence also spread to Kukdol village, located 8 km from Khargone where a Muslim family was allegedly beaten up by a group of men and issued rape threats on Tuesday night.

(Edited by: Manoj Ramachandran)


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