By Puja Awasthi
On January 4, charges were finally framed in the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots case, by a special MP MLA court in Muzaffarnagar against 19 people including Uttar Pradesh BJP leaders Kapil Dev Agarwal, Sanjeev Balyan, ex-UP minister Suresh Rana and Samajwadi Party MP Harender Malik for violating prohibitory orders and inciting communal tension.
The framing of the charges took this long because it was a pre-requisite that all accused be present in the court together for the charges to be announced. In the interim, more than 1,000 people have been acquitted in 97 cases of rape, murder, arson and robbery by district and sessions courts which are trying the cases that mention names, apart from those of the public representatives who are being tried by the MP MLA court.
In September 2013, over one and a half lakh people attended a mahapanchayat some 20 kilomeres away from Muzaffarnagar in Uttar Pradesh. These people were from Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Delhi and had gathered to oppose a clash on August 27 at Kawal village under Jansath tehsil of Muzaffarnagar. Three youths from two communities had been killed over a trivial incident and the incident given a communal colour.
Following the killings, old videos of Hindus being killed in Pakistan were widely circulated as were inflammatory messages. Large meetings and also shok sabhas (condolence meetings) were held for the two Hindu brothers killed in the violence.
The police, after the August 27 violence, raided Kawal. The Samajwadi Party government of the day reacted by shunting out the district magistrate and the seniormost police officer, under the guise that the raid had not followed protocol. The dominant Jat population had, however, concluded that they were shifted because of their castes.
This story was originally published in theweek.in. Read the full story here.
