Police inaction behind Bihar communal clash

Two days after a youth, an intermediate student of Saraiyya in Muzaffarpur, went missing, his father lodged an FIR on January 9. But, the police treated it as another case of elopement and remained inactive till the boy’s body was found buried on Sunday in a paddy field in Azizpur village, a small hamlet near south-east Muzaffarpur, where 80 families reside.

As the news of the boy’s death spread, nearly 2,000 people stormed Azizpur, set afire 50 houses, four-wheelers and two-wheelers before killing four persons and injuring several others.

The Muzaffarpur police was found napping here as it took three hours for them to reach the site. This gave the criminal elements, who joined the mob, ample time to indulge in mindless violence and cause mayhem in an area which earlier never had witnessed any communal frenzy.

It is said that the boy was in love with a girl from another community of Azizpur. The girl’s brother, who was a close friend of the deceased, has now been apprehended, besides fourteen others, while 2,000 unknown persons have been named accused in the FIR.

More than 2,500 police personnel, including Bihar Military Police (BMP), State Auxiliary Police (SAP) have been deployed in and around the village besides conducting flag march to instil confidence. “We are taking all precautions to restore normalcy” said Senior SP (SSP) of Muzaffarpur, Rajesh Mishra. Meanwhile, the youth’s body was handed over to his family after autopsy. It was consigned to flames amid tight security. Four other persons killed in mob violence were also buried in the village graveyard.