A girl outside a house whose occupants fled Trilokpuri during the Diwali riots. (Epxress photo by Oinam Anand)
More than a week after the communal clashes in Trilokpuri, the area has started limping back to normal with breadwinners in families who fled slowly returning. But most tenants stay away, fearing more violence, and those who have come back say memories of the Diwali troubles haunt them.
Bittu Naseem, 36, runs a thela selling peanuts and popcorn in block 27 of Trilokpuri. He returned home to Sanjay Gandhi camp on Sunday, leaving his wife and two teenaged daughters in Moradabad. “My daughters and niece are still young and I still shiver when I think of how we spent Diwali night and the day after. We rushed to Moradabad on October 24 afternoon after Diwali, leaving everything here,”he said. “I was forced to come back because I have to send money home to my family in Muzaffarnagar.”
Reena, Bittu’s 18-year-old niece, told Newsline on phone that she is eager to return but her mother is still worried. “We do not have a man in the house, so my mother is doubly scared,” Reena said.
With elections in Delhi coming soon, many who were thinking of returning say they may not.
Local resident Rana, who is away, said though her decorator husband is missing work, they do not wish to return. “I shudder to think of how Trilokpuri was when we left. People tell me everything has been cleared but look at what happened before the elections in Western UP?” she said.
At the Sanjay Gandhi camp, there were rows of houses with locked doors. Mukesh, 36, and Prabha Devi, 63, are the two Valmiki families in the neighbourhood dominated by Muslims. Mukesh said he had sent his wife and daughter to Jafrabad ahead of Muharram. “Muslims here are my childhood friends, but these clashes have left their scars,” he said.
Story continues below this ad
Thirty-year-old Baby, a safai karamchari, had also fled to her village in Agra with her two daughters. She was among the few women who ventured out of home on Muharram. She returned to Trilokuri on Monday to resume work but left behind her daughters, aged 8 and 12.
“They both go to school, but I hear hardly any children or teachers are going to the government schools in Trilokpuri,” she said. “Anyway, look at the police force, the burnt shops. Is this the atmosphere to which I can bring my girls back?”
People who have returned say they feel like strangers in the neghbourhood they were born in. They are cautious of the many rumours that are still doing the rounds. Alimuddin, 25, was sent to his relatives’ house by his parents on the night the riots broke out. He returned on October 30. “There is peace today but there is fear. The other communities look at us with suspicion now,” he said.
A member of the intezamia committee of the Imam Bada, the Shia mosque in block 27, said the fear was natural. “We have been telling people to get their families back, it is the only way to return to normalcy.” The Imam Mubarak from the Sunni mosque in the area said, “People who own houses here have been forced to return, but tenants are still staying away.”
Mohammad Naeem Ahmed, a volunteer with the Hindu Muslim Sikh Isai Ekta Committee, said after Muharram, effort will be made to convince people to bring their families back. Until now, we have been busy with putting rumours to rest and convincing people to maintain peace. Now we will encourage people to call their families, particularly women and children, back.”
Kaunain Sheriff M is an award-winning investigative journalist and the National Health Editor at The Indian Express. He is the author of Johnson & Johnson Files: The Indian Secrets of a Global Giant, an investigation into one of the world’s most powerful pharmaceutical companies.
With over a decade of experience, Kaunain brings deep expertise in three areas of investigative journalism: law, health, and data. He currently leads The Indian Express newsroom’s in-depth coverage of health.
His work has earned some of the most prestigious honours in journalism, including the Ramnath Goenka Award for Excellence in Journalism, the Society of Publishers in Asia (SOPA) Award, and the Mumbai Press Club’s Red Ink Award.
Kaunain has also collaborated on major global investigations. He was part of the Implant Files project with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which exposed malpractices in the medical device industry across the world. He also contributed to an international investigation that uncovered how a Chinese big-data firm was monitoring thousands of prominent Indian individuals and institutions in real time.
Over the years, he has reported on several high-profile criminal trials, including the Hashimpura massacre, the 2G spectrum scam, and the coal block allocation case. Within The Indian Express, he has been honoured three times with the Indian Express Excellence Award for his investigations—on the anti-Sikh riots, the Vyapam exam scam, and the abuse of the National Security Act in Uttar Pradesh. ... Read More
4 min read
A girl outside a house whose occupants fled Trilokpuri during the Diwali riots. (Epxress photo by Oinam Anand)
