By Rakhi Bose / Outlook India
North-East Delhi resident Mallika will never forget the chants of ‘Jai Shri Ram’ and ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ amid the shrieks of her husband. On February 25, 2020, a mob of rioters entered her house on the third floor in Bhagirathi Vihar and beat her husband to death. She had hidden him under the bed after her landlord informed her that armed mobs with torches and ‘sariyas’ were going from door to door and hunting down Muslim men. But they found him. “They beat him and bludgeoned his head with the rods. He kept begging for mercy till the time he died. My 12-year-old daughter asked them to stop in the name of humanity. They said, “We don’t consider Muslims human”. They killed him in front of our eyes,” Mallika narrates. That was not all. “After killing him, they dragged his lifeless body down three flights of stairs and then torched it before throwing the charred body in the nalla (high drain)”.
Mallika is one of the scores of women who were widowed during the 2020 northeast Delhi riots. On the second anniversary of the horrific riots, Mallika and other victims of the sectarian violence came to the heart of Delhi to remind the world that for them, the horror was not yet over. Mallika recalls how she had to escape her home by putting ’sindoor’ on her forehead and pretending to be a Hindu. “They unzipped my infant son’s pants to check whether he is Muslim. They wanted to kill him too. I managed to save him that day,” Mallika tells Outlook.
Families of the 53 lives that were lost during the violence – 38 Muslim victims and 15 Hindus – have all been compensated. The Delhi government provided Rs 10 lakh to each of the families. Imrana Bibi, whose husband was shot dead while on his way to pay his children’s school fee, has eight daughters and no bread-earner in the family. “We are living our days out using the compensation money. But we don’t know what will happen in the future. 10 lakh is not enough to feed, educate my daughters for life or marry them off later,” Imrana sobs. Families of minor victims were given Rs 5 lakh and Rs 2 lakh was given for injuries. Victims, however, claim that the cost does not cover the psychological trauma and life-long social debilitation. Apart from the lives lost, many victims were faced with bankruptcy after rioters looted and burnt their homes and shops.
This article first appeared on outlookindia.com
