The Hindu : Front Page : VHP move foiled

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Sep 13, 2004

Front Page

VHP move foiled

By Meena Menon

POLADPUR (MAHARASHTRA), SEPT. 12. Heavy security arrangements today prevented the Vishwa Hindu Parishad from carrying out its plan to destroy the tomb of Afzal Khan and the so-called "illegal structures" on it at Pratapgarh Fort, 24 km from here.

However, the agitation turned violent in Panchwad in Satara district, where VHP members indulged in stone-throwing and blocked traffic on the Pune-Satara road for an hour before the police ordered a lathicharge.

VHP leaders Venkatesh Abdeo, Babuji Natekar and others were among the 250 people arrested on several charges, including unlawful assembly and destroying public property.

State of siege

The main entry points to the fort were sealed for the day and no traffic was permitted. Several heavily guarded checkpoints ensured that no VHP member made it to the tomb on the fort. Police detained over 150 VHP and Bajrang Dal members in Raigarh district too. Vehicles on the Bombay-Goa highway were checked and no one was allowed to go anywhere near the fort, not even a busload of journalists, ferried there by the district administration to Ambenali, at the foothill of Pratapgarh.

Prohibitory orders were in force around the fort and in the Mahad and Poladpur talukas of Raigarh district.

The VHP zonal secretary, Venkatesh Abdeo, however, claimed that four persons had managed to reach the base of the fort before they were arrested. Hundreds of VHP members who were prevented from going to the fort held a meeting in Panchwad in Satara district to claim victory.

The VHP members then decided to block the Pune-Satara road and when the police asked them to move, they started throwing stones on the policemen as well as on passing vehicles.

The Satara superintendent of police, Chandrakant Kumbhar, said that the move was planned and it happened in the middle of the meeting.

He said some policemen as well as passersby, apart from others were injured. The situation was peaceful by evening, he said.

Hide and seek game

Many VHP members had to play a game of hide and seek to get to Poladpur. Sandeep Gawde walked from 3 a.m. to reach Poladpur only to find the police determined to keep them out. Naresh Salvi, also from Mumbai, walked several hours to go to Pratapgarh and "break all the illegal structures on the tomb." Said Gawde, "We would have done it with our empty hands, like Babri Masjid, what did we have then in our hands?"

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