Hanging on in Mehsana

Sardarpura will be voting twice on December 12: for the Vijapur Assembly seat and the Mehsana Lok Sabha seat. After the massacre in the neighbouring Sheikhwada colony, all the 80-odd Muslim families in the town, except those in Pathanwas, fled to Satnagar, which is about 50 kilometres away. They haven’t dared to return yet.

It is obvious that the Pathans in Pathanwas were allowed to stay back after a tacit pact with the local Hindus. Otherwise, it is hard to believe that none of them saw or heard anything on March 1, which is what they told the police.

Fear blankets the area, so much so that residents won’t even give directions to Sheikhwada. Most of the Muslims are poor and depend on the 3,000-odd rich Patel families for their livelihood. Understandably, they don’t want to speak against them.

‘‘We try to avoid any trouble. I used to draw water for my field from the borewell of a Patel farmer. Now, he refuses to let me do so. But I hope the problem will be resolved. After all, we have to live here together. All the same, I have no water for my fields,’’ said Himmatkhan Pathan.

Another resident, Zoharkhan Pathan, added: ‘‘We don’t want to move out of here. But if this social boycott continues, things will be difficult.’’

According to District collector A.S. Patel, the Pathan families haven’t lodged a formal complaint about the social boycott. ‘‘Even Election Commission observers visited them but received no such complaints,’’ he said, adding, ‘‘however, we will be providing them security for voting.’’

And in Satnagar, the Muslim migrants want to vote — if only to punish the BJP. ‘‘We cannot return home as long as the BJP government is in power,’’ said Shamabanu Sheikh, a mother of three whose husband was killed in the Sardarpura massacre. ‘‘So I will vote for its removal.’’ Since it will be difficult for people like her to return to Sardarpur to vote, the administration is setting up polling booths for them in Himmatnagar.