By : ANANYA BHARDWAJ
New Delhi: A group of at least 200 people were gathered around a Muslim cemetery armed with hammers, sickles and axes. This was just 100 metres from the Gokulpuri police station in Northeast Delhi. On one call, all of them raised their tools and struck the building’s boundary wall.
“Jai Shri Ram,” they said, and struck again. There was not a single policeman in the vicinity to stop them.A part of the mob then ran across the road and set two shops that had ‘Khan’ written on them on fire. And still no policemen, who were clearly outnumbered, tried to stop them. The incidents of violence only worsened areas of Jaffarabad, Maujpur, Babarpur, Yamuna Vihar, Shiv Vihar, Gokulpuri, Brahmpuri, Chand Bagh and Ghonda, with over a dozen shops set afire, 25 houses vandalised and 100+-odd vehicles burnt but there were only four to five policemen deployed every 100 meters in the localities.
A few personnel from the Rapid Action Force too were seen, but only outside the barricades that were placed to block entry to the narrow lanes leading to colonies in Chand Bagh and Gokulpuri.