Tejasvi Surya Held in Karauli, Curfew in Khargone: Why These Rajasthan, MP Dists are on the Boil

BJP MP Tejasvi Surya and BJP Rajasthan president Satish Poonia have been detained while the two were on their way to violence-hit Karauli in Rajasthan. Surya was accompanied by BJP state president Satish Poonia and party workers when the Rajasthan police stopped them at the Dausa border before detaining them.

“Section 144 is not in place at where we are now…It’s our constitutional right to go to Karauli. This dictatorial govt is snatching our rights, which is why we are protesting,” Tejasvi Surya said after he was stopped by police while visiting Karauli on Wednesday. Later, talking to reporters, Surya said there’s “misgovernance in Rajasthan” where law and order have “completely collapsed” and “rioters are roaming free”.

The BJP leaders had accused the Congress-led state government of blocking his party workers from visiting the riot-hit. Barricades have been erected to prevent the group from entering.

Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, however, slammed the BJP saying the party is “constantly trying” to create a “communal atmosphere in the state”.

A fight between two communities had broken out on April 2 in Karauli in which about 35 people were injured and shops and houses of more than 80 people were burnt in arson, according to authorities. The violence started when some participants of a bike rally — carried out on the occasion of Hindu New Year — raised provoking slogans passing through a Muslim-dominated area, which was responded with heavy stone pelting from nearby houses, the state police chief had earlier said.

As of last Friday, 23 people were arrested and 44 others were identified in connection with the violence. A total of 10 FIRs have been registered in the case, including one by the police themselves.

Khargone

Meanwhile, curfew continued in violence-hit Khargone city of Madhya Pradesh for the third day on Wednesday and officials denied reports that over 100 families were forced to migrate.

Around 100 people have been arrested so far for allegedly indulging in the violence which broke out after stones were pelted on a Ram Navami procession on Sunday in Khargone, Additional Superintendent of Police Neeraj Chourasia said.

After the violence, curfew had been imposed in the entire Khargone city on Sunday evening. The curfew in continuing for the third day with relief being given only for medical emergencies, the police official said. Asked about a memorandum submitted by Muslim clerics in Bhopal to state director general of police alleging that religious flags were put up on the wall of a mosque during the Ram Navami procession, Chourasia denied that any such thing happened. A picture circulated on social media on the issue was not of Khargone, he said.

The official appealed to people to maintain peace and not pay attention to rumours. The clerics had also alleged the Khargone district administration demolished many houses and properties belonging to members of the minority community in a hurried action without a probe, forcing over 100 Muslim families to migrate from the city.

However, sub-divisional magistrate Milind Dhoke on Wednesday said the reports that over 100 families were forced to migrate from different trouble-torn areas were “not true”. Those whose houses were torched or damaged in stone-pelting have gone to their relatives’ place and the number of such families is only two-three, he said in a statement.

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