Curfew continues in Banphoolpura, relaxed in other parts of Haldwani
By ARUN PRATAP SINGH
HALDWANI/DEHRADUN, 10 Feb: Situation in Haldwani after the violence by members of a particular community in Banphoopura area against the state continues to be under control but tense on the third day of the incident on Saturday. While no fresh incident has been reported so far, the police started taking action against the culprits. The curfew continues in Banphoolpura area which was the scene of offence but has been either lifted or relaxed in most areas of Haldwani including the Nainital Highway. The Internet services remain affected even on Saturday.
Of course, there are conflicting reports in respect of the number of arrests made so far. While speaking to the media, early Saturday, SSP Prahlad Narayan Meena confirmed the arrest of only 5 persons so far. Unofficial sources claimed that four more persons had been arrested making the total number of those arrested to nine. On Friday, certain officials’ claim that 24 persons were arrested did not turn out to be true. According to the police, the main culprit behind the violence has been identified as Abdul Malik and according to some unconfirmed reports, he and his son have also been arrested. Malik and his son are being stated to be the masterminds of the Haldwani violence, It may be recalled here that the illegal structures that were demolished on Thursday resulting in unprecedented level of violence against the police, the municipal officials and the media persons covering the violence, had been constructed by Malik.
It is also worth recalling here that the said illegal structures including an alleged Madrasa and a Namaj site had been constructed on the land registered in name of the Haldwani Municipal Corporation as Nazul Land and following its demolition orders had been sealed by the authorities since a few weeks. The land in question had allegedly been under illegal possession of Abdul Malik and unofficially referred by him and his supporters as Mailk Ka Bagicha though officially no such name exists in official records anywhere.
According to SSP, PN Meena, three FIRs have been registered so far in this regard against 5,000 persons including 19 named and identified accused. Meena also stated that the process is underway to identify more persons based on CCTV footage and other inputs. The police meanwhile has taken into its possession CCTV footage and the hard discs from the crime scene and is investigating the tapes in order to identify more accused. It is also being claimed that many of those already identified and not identified are in hiding and the police have not been able to locate them so far.
Name of some political leaders including a former municipal corporator and brother of SP leader Matin Siddique, Jawed Siddique has also been arrested by the police for instigating violence it is learnt. Abdul Malik, his son and Jawed Siddique are learnt to be leading the mob at the time of the violence, and even firing at the police officials. Those injured and hospitalised including the police men and women and the media persons have also claimed that the miscreants had tried to burn them alive. Many equipment of the photo journalists and videographers were also damaged by the miscreants.
Police is scanning the footage of all the CCTV cameras installed in the area, miscreants are being identified on the basis of that footage. Apart from this, some media footage has also been received by the police, which is also being viewed. A hunt out is on for the unruly people who are underground.
State machinery lacks prompt actionBy ARUN PRATAP SINGHHALDWANI/DEHRADUN, 10 Feb: A Hindu boy Ajay who had come out of his house on the fateful day of violence to buy medicines for his mother was also shot at by miscreants. The young man is undergoing treatment in the hospital. After this incident, a video of the youth’s mother is being circulated on the Internet media. In the video, the woman is seen telling that her son had gone to get medicines before he was shot by the rioters.According to the eye witnesses including the media persons, in Banbhoolpura, miscreants had brutally opened fire with licensed and illegal weapons on Thursday. All the five people who died in the uproar were shot. Prakash Kumar of Bajpur was shot dead three times. Then this body was thrown on the railway track near Indiranagar gate. Police recovered the body on Friday. During the violence in Banbhoolpura, most of the police personnel were barely armed with sticks and rods, even as the men, women and even the children of a particular community started pelting stones from atop their roofs and from all possible directions. The stone pelting continued for well over two-and-half hours, which exposes the fact that the administration and the police were taken by surprise and were unable to deal with the violence promptly and effectively. Hundreds of police personnel were left bleeding. After stone pelting, the miscreants opened fire, in which Prakash Kumar of Bajpur, Faim Qureshi of Banbhoolpura, Zahid, Mohd. Anas, Shabad died. Stone pelting was followed by throwing petrol bombs and attempt was made to burn alive many officials.The miscreants had both legal and illegal weapons and apparently had no fear of anyone. There were three bullets in the body of Prakash of Bajpur; post mortem of the body was conducted on Saturday. Here, on Friday, the police conducted post-mortem of the bodies of four Muslims. Late in the evening the dead bodies were handed over to their relatives and cremated.What is a matter of grave concern is the fact that it has surfaced that Intelligence inputs of possible violence had been made available to the district administration and the top police administration in the district but were not taken seriously. There are many lessons for the government, the administration and the general public to learn from this incident which happened without any religious provocation and or slogans of Jai Shri Ram, etc. That the miscreants, all from a particular community targeted the police, burnt a police station, burnt down as many as 80 vehicles including many police and Nagar Nigam vehicles shows that they were challenging the state and the system and it very clear that the system failed to act effectively in time to counter challenge the miscreants.
