BOMBAY: Several journalists belonging to one community were attacked and their homes and Property destroyed during the violence that overshadowed Bombay.
The house of Hanon Rashid, editor of Urdu Blitz, was among 30 that were attacked and burnt in the Diamond Jubilee compound in Thakurdwar late at night on Jan.16. The assailants, about 70, had tried to enter the compound on Friday night, but left after damaging the cars that were parked in front, Rashid said.
On Saturday morning, they returned, surrounded the compound, climbed to the rooftops of houses in front of it and threw stones and acid bombs. By 5 p.m., all the families fled their homes, many of them with nothing but the clothes on their backs, Rashid left with his wife and two children.
By midnight, the rioters returned with the help of searchlights installed on the rooftops of neighboring buildings, they flung huge stones to shatter the door of Rashid’s house and threw in fire bombs and burning rags soaked in petrol. The fire spread to other houses as well. Rashid said nothing remained of his house except the four walls.
Rashid said his family had lived in Diamond Jubilee compound in Thakurdwar since 1925, and most other families have been there for about as Jong. We have had very good relations with the Hindus in ‘Thakurdwar, and the local Shiv Sena councilor is a friend of mine” Rashid said.
Yet, repeated appeals to the Lokmanya Tilak Marg police station, the councilor and even patrolling army men were to no avail. ‘There is no door on which I did not knock,” said Rashid, who is looked upon as a leader of the community in the area by virtue of being newspaper editor.
In a similar attack, the residence of Farooq Ansari, a reporter for Urdu Times, was burnt down by rampaging mobs, Ansari had rented the room in a shawl at Fijamata Nagar in Worli just a month ago. He was tipped off about the attack and fled with his family.
A photographer for Urdu Times, Abbas Sabahat, was stopped and dragged out of his car at Parel. He was saved from the mob’s fury by passersby on the road.
Urdu Times did not come out today, its executive editor, Sajid Rashid, said.
Five employees of Inquilab the Urdu newspaper brought out by the Midday group of publications, have also had to flee their homes in the face of attacks by suspected Shiv Sainiks, Midday sources said two employees who fled their homes in Girgaum on Friday now find that they have been occupied.
A third, a journalist whose house in Nagpada was ransacked, had to seek shelter in a relief camp setup by the peace committee in the area.
Two employees who left their homes in Tardeo, the scene of heavy rioting recently, are now too frightened to return, sources said.
In another incident last Friday, three journalists from Mahanagar, a city paper that has consistently taken on the Shiv Sena, were attacked by suspected activists of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (AB VP) at Hinduja college, where they had gone to cover a college strike.
Manmohan Bharati, a reporter for the Hindu Mahanagar, was stabbed in the back as he stood looking at a poster of Anand Patwardhan’s film, Ram Ke Naam, whose screening at the college had earlier been stormed and stopped by the ABVP, and He is now in the Bombay hospital.
His colleague, Rajesh Jani, was beaten up, while Deepak Lokhande of the Marathi Mahanagar who was also stabbed but not seriously wounded, according to the editor of the paper, Nikhil Wagle.
Two other Mahanagar journalists, Rajan Parab and Prakash Parsekar, were also prey to mob fury. Parab was threatened and gheraoed at Parel village on Saturday evening by rioters, but escaped with light injuries. Parsekar aphotographer, was gheraoed and abused in Sion on Sunday morning.
Brahmajit Singh, a stringer for Hindi Madhnagar, was stabbed at Kurla on Sunday morning, and admitted to Rajawadi hospital, Wagle said.
At Bhand up on Sunday evening, Harold Rasquinha, a subeditor with UNI, was beaten up when he tried to get past a mob at the station saying he was a journalist.
Article extracted from this publication >> January 22, 1993
