Darogar Alga (Assam): In what may spark a controversy, villagers of Darogar Alga Char in Assam’s Goalpara district alleged that they tore down a madrassa on instruction given indirectly by the police, a charge which the superintendent of police dismissed as baseless.
The locals asserted that the communication was sent to a fellow villager having connections in the force and it was he who asked people to pull down the structure.
The police, however, denied the charge saying they were only investigating a case of alleged terror links of two persons, now absconding, who were teaching at the seminary.
According to the police, the Darogar Alga madrassa and a reed house on its premises were demolished on Tuesday by the villagers themselves after the emergence of “suspected jihadi links” with its two teachers, who were reportedly Bangladeshis.
“I was among those who pulled down the two structures. I was working in my jute field on the riverside when Shukur Ali (a villager) called me to the madrassa compound. He asked me and five-six others to help him demolish them,” Rahim Badshah, a local, told PTI here.
Ali is a self-proclaimed BJP worker in the sandbank. His motorcycle carries a lotus (BJP party symbol) sticker. Several such stickers are also visible on the walls of his residence.
“When I asked Ali why we should demolish the madrassa, he said that SP (superintendent of police) and DSP (deputy superintendent of police) sirs have asked us to do so. When I reached the madrassa compound, the media were already there,” Badshah claimed.
Several other villagers corroborated Badshah’s assertion.
When asked, Ali accepted that the media was invited beforehand to cover the demolition and the structures were pulled down in front of them. However, he was silent on the police asking him to demolish the madrassa.
When approached for his comment, Goalpara Superintendent of Police V V Rakesh Reddy said the force had “absolutely no role” in bringing down the seminary and the adjacent temporary one-room house.
“From our side, there was no communication for the villagers saying that they proceed with it (demolition). Had it been planned, the district administration would have taken the steps accordingly,” Reddy told PTI over the phone.
Reddy said that the villagers never thought the madrassa teachers who had left suddenly had links with terror outfits.
This story was originally published in newsclick.in . Read the full story here