Fear grips Indian city after deadly clashes over mosque survey

FE Team | Published: November 26, 2024 22:04:47

SAMBHAL, Nov 26 (BBC/AFP): Two days after deadly violence in Sambhal left four people dead and many others injured, the city in India's northern state of Uttar Pradesh remains gripped by tension.
The violence broke out on Sunday during a court-ordered survey of the centuries-old Shahi Jama Masjid (mosque) that some Hindu groups claim was built at the site of a destroyed temple.
Police said the protesters, most of them Muslims, pelted them with stones and that they fired teargas shells and rubber bullets to disperse the crowds. They said 20 policemen were injured.
But family members of the four Muslim men who died on Sunday alleged that they were shot dead by police - a charge the police have denied.
The death toll from violent protests has risen to six, an official said Tuesday. Around 20 police officers were also wounded during the violence on Sunday in Sambhal in India's northern state of Uttar Pradesh, district magistrate Chirag Goyal told AFP.
Officials say the situation is now under control but a large number of police and paramilitaries are deployed around the mosque and the rest of the city. The streets are eerily silent, littered with stones and dotted with ash marks where vehicles were set on fire.
Local authorities have imposed a ban on entry of outsiders, social activists and politicians to the city until December 01. Internet services have been suspended and schools have been shut.
Police have registered seven cases in connection with the violence and at least 25 people have been arrested. On Monday, BBC Hindi met the grief-stricken families of the men killed during the violence.
In the Tabela Kot area, Idro Ghazi continues to grieve inconsolably. Her 34-year-old son, Naeem Ghazi, was among the dead. Her son, she said, was not a part of the protest and had gone to the market to purchase oil. He was surrounded and shot near the mosque, she alleged.
Despite her grief, the devastated mother has decided not to lodge a case against the police. "We do not have the courage to fight the police and the government," she said, her voice heavy with sorrow.
About two kilometres away, in the Baghicha Sarayatrin colony, a silent crowd had gathered outside a mosque. Nafees, who lost his 22-year-old son Bilal in the violence, sat on the steps with his head bowed.
His son, he said, had gone to buy clothes when he was killed. "The police shot him in the chest," he alleged. The police have denied these allegations. Senior police official Muniraj G told BBC Hindi that the police did not open fire on the crowd during the violence.