Author: ANI
Publication: NewKerala.com
Date: August 8, 2006
URL: http://www.newkerala.com/news4.php?action=fullnews&id=3884
[Note from the Hindu Vivek Kendra: This event
will receive only a passing reference in the national media because it cannot
be even remotely assocaited with the 'Hindu fundamentalists.' Furthermore,
even if it is covered, the actions of the Muslims burning the Hindu homes
will be rationalised as a justified reaction.]
The killing of a Muslim trader in Uttar Pradesh's
Chandauli District has triggered off communal violence in the area.
Houses of several Hindu families were razed
to the ground on Monday in the wake of trader Arshad Ahmed's killing.
"Around three or four in the afternoon,
they announced on the loudspeaker 'wherever you find Yadavs, kill the children
and ransack and burn the houses. We heard the announcement and hid ourselves,"
said Uday Yadav, an affected villager.
Yadav alleged the miscreants broke the door
of his house and took away his valuables.
Police have deployed security in the area
in an attempt to bring the situation under control.
"The brother of the chief of the village,
Khurshid Ahmed, was going to Mughal Sarai on the Grand Trunk road. Two men
followed him and fired at him. When he fell down, they fired at him from point-blank
range. He died on the way to hospital," said A.K. Shukla, Additional
Superintendent of Police.
Grieving relatives of the trader alleged that
local goons of the Yadav community had killed Ahmed.
"People had threatened him if he contested
the local elections they would teach him a lesson, and if he became the chief
they would take revenge. They are people from the Yadav belt," said Shameem,
a relative of Arshad Ahmed.
Uttar Pradesh's Chandauli is communally sensitive
area and there have been several incidents of violence in the past involving
the Yadav community and the Muslims.