SFG: GMD003
Duration: 00:59:06; Aspect Ratio: 1.333:1; Hue: 33.369; Saturation: 0.025; Lightness: 0.454; Volume: 0.209; Cuts per Minute: 3.468
Summary: This contains interviews and a few visuals from a locality which resisted the attacking mobs during the carnage- which had a combination of both hindus and muslims, and who unitedly fought against the mob. They were arrested by the police and taken away, instead of being helped. Subsequently, their houses were burnt. One of the interviews is with a hindu member of the locality who was also arrested and taken away.
This video is part of a collection documenting the events of three days in #AD4, a slum colony in Ahmedabad city, after the burning of Hindu activists on the Sabarmati Express at Godhra station on Feb 27th, 2002.
The Godhra killings were shocking in themselves, but the Hindu right-wing's systematic targeting of Muslim citizens for three days after Godhra shook the faith of all who had believed the country to be a secular democracy.
For three days – Feb 27th, 28th and March 1st - the state government and state police allowed the right-wing mobs to "retaliate". They raped, looted, burned and murdered freely. We know this through thousands of first-hand accounts related by the victims and witnesses of the rampaging mobs and indifferent government agencies.
About a month after the post-Godhra carnage, a group of filmmakers, camerapersons, media students and other volunteers formed the Shared Footage Group that spent close to a year traveling through the relief camps, decimated slums and housing societies to record people’s accounts of what happened in those three days. The stories are varied. Victims in some cases comprised Dalit Hindus, and saviours, in some instances, included local political leaders and policemen with a conscience.
The story of this Basti, (locality) told through these events here, is relatively painless. Relatively, because people lost everything they possessed, but remained alive. Here is their telling of what happened to them in their own homes in those 'days of calamity' or "
qayamat ke din".
See other videos documenting the events at #AD4:
From One Basti in Ahmedabad
#AD3
Shot on 18.11.02 12:30pm
Visual
#AD4 story
cut aways of #FN3
peeling of garlic or rather preparing for food
Woman in kitchen peeling garlic, chats lightly with cameraperson.
a
crew member's address
#AD3
Interview
Shot on 18.11.02
#AD4 story
int with #MN2, m, 20+- talks about attack done by the mob & how they resisted it & fought it
a
gives own name and address
a
mentions locality
Bajrang Dal
Post-Godhra
attacks
police
slum
A young man begins to describe what happened in his neighbourhood on day 1 of the post-Godhra attacks. Everyone was in their homes, late in the evening. The attack started from one direction of the slum. The young man, his family and others went and hid in a nearby slum by the mill. The next day at noon they attacked back, to reclaim their homes. They fought with the Bajrang Dal activists (Hindu right-wing group). These had burnt down their homes. The police, witnessing this, did not save the homes. When the people tried to save their homes, attacking back, the police stepped, trying to stop them from fighting back. The people fought back anyway, getting their courage up. The Bajrang Dal had swords and tridents, and were burning their homes. When the people tried to save these, the police caught them and put them in the police vans.
Interviewer asks details of the previous evening.
The young man says he was hiding in the nearby slum with his wife and child, other family members too. They planned to fight back. They tried, but had to retreat again for the night.
a
mentions activist's name
The next day at noon, the attackers came back from two directions, the police watched homes being burnt. When the people attacked back, the police told them to go. When they would not, they forced them into the police vans.
Interviewer asks if they asked people nearby for help. The man says that they entreated people living nearby, but no one would help. The police would not chase away the rioters who were wearing safron scarves and brandishing swords and tridents...
Saffron
swords
tridents
The police said you all go indoors, we'll chase away the attackers. At first we ran, then came back to fight.
The people chased the mob away towards the theatre, around 6 or 7pm. They used bricks against the attackers with their weapons. They reprimanded the local shopkeepers for not helping to send away the attackers.
a
mentions landmark
The people slept despite the threat of being attacked at night. Some slept, some sat up, they waited for day.
As they ran away, the police started shooting at them. So they were attacked by the right-wing mob and by the police at once. This drove them to decide that they would fight for their homes at any cost. They would protest. They did manage to chase off the attackers and then the police forced them into the vans.
How could they fight with women and children by their side? So they smuggled them away towards the railway track, past this there was a relief camp. The women and children were safe there and the men returned to fight for the homes. They were apprehended by the police when they came back to fight. The homes burned. The police allowed this and instead, put the residents away for fighting the attackers.
Interviewer asks why he didn't tell the mob that there were Hindu homes in this colony too, and that they too were being attacked alongside the Muslim homes.
The man replies that the mob was going crazy with swords, how could anyone reason with it? One of his brothers disappeared in the fracas. No one's seen him since. They searched very hard across the country, but have had no luck.
Interviewer asks how they were treated at the police station. The young man says they were beaten up. They were asked why they attacked the attackers when the police was there to save their homes... They replied that they were trying to save their own homes for their children. When they said this, the police beat them up. The man says that although they are uneducated people, they have lived in this area for 50 years and never have they been attacked like this in their own homes.
jail
police
refugee camp
a
mentions locality
After they were arrested, three days passed, but no one came to the police station to get them out. They worried terribly about their women and kids. They asked the policemen to help their families alone out there: small children, sisters, old people. The police told them that the families from their slum were at the refugee camps.
They were let out of jail 26 days later. They came back to find the whole place burnt down, no one to ask after them. They went to the refugee camp and found their families there.
About living in harmony with his Muslim neighbours, the man says they all grew up together, ate and played together. During the attack they decided to live or die, but not as people of different faiths, but as one unit. They went to jail together and also stayed at the camp together.
They never feared living at the mostly Muslim camp. They had fear only for the lives of their children during the mob attack.
They will live and fight shoulder-to-shoulder with their Muslim neighbours.
a
name of locality
He talks about his work. He used to grind spices and sell rings.
He says that the whole slum was completely burnt down. But even then no one thought that they should rebuild the slum segregating Hindus from Muslims, Sikhs from Christians. Everyone's houses had burnt down. While they were being burnt down, the Hindu slumdwellers didn't go out saying that they were also Hindus and so they should be spared and the others killed. They said instead that they would fight back together for their homes.
The Hindus of the colony and everyone else knew that the attackers were Hindu, but no one thought of religion. Because when they were growing up together, they didn't think religion then. That was the kind of unity they had.
a
gives own and parents' name, locality
The young man begins a new interview, introducing himself again. Begins to tell about the attack on his slum on Day One of the riots.
This area was attacked three places. A home, a mill and another place. From over the bridge too they threw petrol bombs. The residents had bricks only to fight back. They managed to chase a mob away with these, despite fighting with their families in tow.
damages
mob
right-wing
weapons
police
#AD3
Interview
Shot on 18.11.02
#AD4 story
details of attack starts from this part of the interview
a
mentions landmarks in locality
The attackers had many kinds of weapons, the young man says. And the residents only thought that they were outsiders, members of the right-wing party. They were wearing safron headbands and carrying tridents. The residents were about 25 or 30, and managed to drive away about 40 to 50 armed attackers. They took courage, sent their women and kids away and fought. The mob attacked two of the slum-dwellers, so the rest attacked the mob and drove it away.
The police arrested the residents for trying to save their own homes. The young man relates how the police treated them. The police said, go back to your women and kids, we will save your homes.
The interviewer asks why the police arrested the residents. The man says that the police arrested them for trying to save their homes. He recounts, dramatically, the conversation between the police and them. How the residents fought the rioters, and how the police fired on the residents, and the residents ran away, but were caught and put into the police van.
The interviewer asks if the outsiders (the attackers) sustained damages, leading to the point that the young man and other residents arrested were eventually tried for murder, when actually no one from among the attackers was more than injured.
The man's brother went missing in the fracas. He hasn't been found to date, the young man says. They searched for him All over the country, but haven't found him. He must have died in the attacks, the man says.
a
mentions brother's name
The young man tells about the damages they sustaned in the riots. First about his lost brother. They were four brothers and the one lost must have died in the attack and his body must have been taken away by the police. He says they spent Rs. 30,000 on the search. They had to sell valuables to raise this money.
compensation money
When the house was burnt down they stayed in the refugee camp. They filled forms, entering details of what they'd lost. Later he was approached by people who said that his compensation cheque had arrived.
#AD3
Interview
Shot on 18.11.02
#AD4
talks about how he was cheated by #MN3
a
Mentions name of person who cheated him out of some compensation money
a
mentions names of people who cheated him of some compensation money
He says they took him at dusk to the police station, and from outside, to someone's house. They sent his wife (who was with him) back, and took him ahead alone. They asked how much of this compensation money he would keep and what part he could give them. He tried to reason with them that his home had been burnt down and he needed all the money. They insisted that he leave a part of the money with them for some expenses. Finally he gave them Rs. 2000.
a
mentions name of person who cheated him of some compensation money
He tells how the policemen threatened him into giving them part of the money. They said they'd take him away and kill him. He says that they are 'educated' people and he is not, so he feared them when they intimidated him, and paid up what he could.
a
mentions name of activist
The man says he told the policemen he'd complain to their local leader. He also asked them why they wanted his money, but they wouldn't answer him.
a
mentions activist's name
He recounts his conversation with his leader, when he returned and complained to him about having been forced to pay part of the compensation money to the police.
a
mentions activist's name
The policemen said that someone like you has received too much money, more than you deserve, so give us half.
a
mentions his locality/name
He says he got frightened and took Rs.2000 out of the packet of money and paid up.
The interviewer asks who were the people who gave them food and shelter the night of the attack, who consoled them.
Consolers said, the young man recalls, don't be afraid. Instead, raise your voice in protest. When the residents protested they finally received food, clothing and money. They built their homes again.
The consolers were messengers, people from Delhi, the Collector's people, the man says.
a
mentions saviour's locality
The ones who kept them at night were their companions from other slums, some were Muslims. They said, we've all suffered... The man says that at one point they suspected that they could not trust these neighbours because there was Hindu-Muslim conflict on, but Munnabhai got them food. He said that they would all protest together.
Hindu-Muslim unity
slum-dwellers
a
mentions saviour's name
On the night of day one, the people of the nearby slum shared their food with them, all sitting together. He says that they asked for food for their women and children who were starving, their houses burnt down, and the neighbouring slum agreed to share their food.
a
about a specific police officer
#AD3
Interview
Shot on 18.11.02
#AD4 story
talks about inspector #MN4 but he was arrested before #MN4 supplied diesel
He talks of a specific police officer who came to their slum while the attack was on.
a
mentions police officer's name
a
mention's police officer's name
a
mention of locality
He talks about the stones they used to defend themselves. The bricks were from their own slum, unbaked.
They were saved by the bricks, he says. Their families ran past the railway tracks to the refugee camp on the other side.
The men of all the familes whose houses were burnt down were forced into the police vans. About 20-25 men. The mob asked for them to be handed over. The police, he says, told them to get out of the van. But the arrested residents refused to get out of the van and insisted the police let them enter the police station. Two at a time got out of the van, then, and were escorted by the police into the station.
police
police vans
#AD3
Interview
Shot on 18.11.02
#AD4 story
talks about how police was planning to give them to mob after arresting them from their homes
Man labouring to rebuild his home. He says that no one's helping him, the government hasn't bothered about him. He and a couple of masons are working on rebuilding.
#AD3
Interview
Shot on 18.11.02 01:30pm
Visual
#AD4 story
man doing construction work complaining about not geting help from anybody
v
crew member in frame
#AD3
Shot on 18.11.02
Visual
#AD4 story
shot of partially constructed walls, bricks lying on the floor, b.g overbridge
Shot of broken house.
#AD3
Shot on 18.11.02
Visual
#AD4 story
shot of #MN5 and his tea shop
Board of Gujarat Sarvajanik Welfare Trust by the local tea shop.
v
crew member in frame
a
mentions own name
A man with four others sitting at a half-constructed shop. He introduces himself. Says he's daily labour. He explains: Godhra incident happened on the 27th of February and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) called for a 'bandh'. No one went to work that day. He points to the area on his left where the right-wing party members and their supporters live. They came from that direction on 28th February, burning homes all the way. He says that his people and he were not looking to fight, they all just went and hid.
28th February
Godhra
VHP
bandh
Interview
Shot on 18.11.02 02:00pm
#AD3
#AD4 story
int with #MN6, m, 20+ - talks about the 28th evening attack & then morning 6 am attack
On 28th, the mob came shouting 'Jai Shri Ram', wearing saffron bandanas. They had maces and tridents. About 5000 people, who attacked about five or six times in one morning. The residents became weak. They were attacked from various directions with help from the police of two divisions. Then the Crime Branch came and took the local boys away. With police help, the vandals burnt down people's houses, he says.
Jai Shri Ram
maces
saffron
tridents
a
mentions landmarks around
When they burnt down this side, the narrator says everyone ran to a safer part of the slum. There the residents who were of various faiths all helped the Muslim residents fight the mob. Even the Hindus among the slum-dwellers didn't want the Muslim households decimated. He says the mob climbed to 20,000. They looted and burnt. Then the residents having lost evrything went to the camp near the railway line.
Hindu
Muslim
attack
burn
loot
mob
weapons
Interviewer asks what happened on the night of the 28th. The man says he was tired and slept. The night of the 27th of Feb, the day the train burnt, he says that no one slept. They were worried about a backlash. There was a kind of curfew in Ahmedabad.
At 6am the mob first attacked. Three police vans came and chased the attackers away. Only once, he says, through the riots, did the police chase away the mob. Probably there was a senior police officer in the vehicle and hence the police acted in accordance with the law.
Again at 7:30am, about 5 to 7,000 people attacked the slum. They had weapons. There were 240 houses in this slum. 40 were Hindu households that stood shoulder-to-shoulder wih their Muslim neighbours and stood up against the mob.
v
crew member in frame
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