It started with Rs 2,000 going missing from a wallet. In the 10 days since, a town in this district of Rajasthan has been swept up in communal tension, with a growing web of charges leading to the arrest of 11 members of the Muslim community for allegedly exploiting Hindu girls.
While the police still look for evidence, the VHP has got involved, Governor Haribhau Bagde has suggested the girls were targeted as they are “associated with a Hindu organisation”, the families of the accused and the local Jama Masjid have got “encroachment” notices, and a town with a mixed population of one lakh that lived largely in peace is battling apprehensions of violence.
Family members of one of the original complaints told The Indian Express that the details spilled out after the father of the girl noticed money missing from his wallet. He questioned his daughter, who confessed to having taken the money. Later, the mother discovered a phone in her daughter’s school bag, on which she had reportedly been talking to a Muslim youth.
According to the family, the girl’s sister, also a minor, was then found to be in touch with another Muslim youth. The girls allegedly told their parents the youths had made videos of their meetings, and were blackmailing them to continue the relationship.
On February 16, the family of the two girls filed an FIR accusing the two Muslim youths of sexually exploiting the girls, and trying to convert them, Later, families of three more minor girls in the same locality filed similar FIRs, naming three other youths.
This story was originally published in indianexpress.com. Read the full story here.
