Ahmedabad, 27 February 2012

Ahmedabad’s Muslim majority area of Shahpur Nagoriwad on Monday evening witnessed an incident of heavy stone pelting. City Police rushed to the spot in minutes and lobbed 11 tear gas shells to control the situation.

When situation was controlled, local Hindu women complained Police that for last week or so, they face stone pelting from highrise buildings of Muslims next door. Finally on Monday they decided to answer back in same style. This sparked a group clash with heavy stone pelting from both sides in Ram chowk locality.

City police zone-2 DCP Shri Harikrushna Patel said that police is taking complains of locals seriously. He said if locals had informed the Police well in advance about daily stone pelting incidents, today’s clash could be prevented.

It should be mentioned that wall city area of Shahpur, once a Hindu majority locality, gradually became Muslim majority area thanks to riots and attacks, possibly related to property cornering. Hindus are minority here and face attacks on regular intervals. Most of the rich and middle class Hindus have shifted to west Ahmedabad, however those left in Shahpur are poor daily wagers who could not buy a property somewhere else, hence they are very much in Shahpur. While most of the days there’s peace, sometime on the occasion of festivals, or many times even randomly, stone pelting incidents occur.

In past a temple was vandalized and murthy was broken in same area, so as a decoration of mosque also faced damage.