Now they hunt those who walk alone

• Two daily-wagers cycling to work from Dhor Bazaar are pelted with stones on Monday, then bludgeoned to death.

• Two residents of Parikshitalal Nagar, Behrampura, on their way home, were burnt alive by a mob on Sunday evening.

While mobs attacking entire neighbourhoods has so far marked violence in the city, there’s a new pattern emerging in recent incidents: mobs targeting unsuspecting individuals. And police say this could be because of the long spell of violence that has now deepened the divide.

Over the last three days, innocent citizens, educated people, have been waylaid by mobs and done to death. Ironically, most of these people were either on their way to work or were hurriedly home on hearing reports of violence in the city.

Take M A Kothawala, the 35-year-old lecturer, who was going to work on his two-wheeler. It was his beard that gave him away. When he slowed his scooter, he was stopped by four people — they stabbed him and them burnt him alive.

Vikas Sahay, Superintendent of Police, Ahmedabad Rural, says Kothawala was going to college and probably the miscreants identified him due to the beard.

On Monday, two unidentified youths riding on cycles to work were stoned to death. There was no visible sign that gave their religion away but it was as if the mob was waiting. ‘‘No one knows their identity. We do not know what the provocation was and doubt if there was one. Even we have not been able to identify them after two days. We only know they belong to a particular community,’’ C A Makwana, Inspector of Kagdapeeth police station says.

‘‘There is so much hate between the two religions that as soon as they see any one of the other community they are attacked. The sad part is that innocent people are being killed,’’ says Special IG Chitturi Surendra Prasad.

Joint Commissioner, Sector-I, Keshav Kumar says: ‘‘I cannot comprehend why they are killing each other like this. I think after so many days of violence, there’s a sense of deep mistrust among people of both communities. Violence has got ingrained in their minds and is finding its expression this way.’’

Even the State Intelligence Bureau, which gathers quite a lot of details from the scene of crime, is perplexed. ‘‘It is beyond anyone’s understanding why people are killing each other so brutally. The mass killings have ended and it is innocent and unsuspecting people who are now victims,’’ a senior officer said.

‘‘With this sense of hatred and mistrust it has become difficult for people of one community to venture into any area dominated by the other community. You never know what can happen to you,’’ says Deputy Commissioner, Zone-III, R D Makadia. Some lower-level police officials, who have been on the field during the violence, feel that the reasons lie in the chawls, narrow lanes and pols of the city where the ‘‘situation is always on the boil.’’

Says an IB official: ‘‘It can be a petrol bomb thrown at someone, an insulting statement about a religion, spitting at each other, abusing a particular community or plain intention to cause terror.’’ According to Joint Commissioner, Sector-II, M K Tandon, ‘‘People of one community do not want people of another community to live with them. By picking on selected targets, they are sending out the message loud and clear.’’