Is it a bird? Is it a plane? NO, it is an “illegal religious structure”*

Some of you may remember this tweet from barbarindian yesterday in which he referred to this report by PTI on the demolition of an “illegal” religious structure:

..Police on Wednesday lobbed teargas shells and used force to disperse scores of people protesting the demolition of an “illegal” religious structure in south-east Delhi.
..
“A number of people gathered at the area police station and marched towards the demolition spot. They were prevented from entering the spot. They broke the barricades and tried to enter the premises. We had to resort to lobbing teargas shells and using some force,” a senior police official said.

Today morning, I woke up to this headline from The Hindu:

Now an innocent mind might wonder what was this “religious structure” and who were the protestors? If you were a certain bent of mind, you may be forgiven in concluding that these are fanatic Hindus at work – again. After all, had not something like this happened recently?? …and then someone might jump in and say:

…this has been happening not just in India, but abroad too…just look at Pakistan – and Malaysia…and some of them even had the cheek to file a petition!

…What is this country coming to? What happened to the secular ideals of the founding fathers of the Constitution?

This must be the handiwork of the evil RSS ..and the Bajrang Dal goons…Trust the BJP to make an issue out of this…

Shameful, disgusting…I hate politics…

But trust the Internet Hindu to be the party pooper…Courtesy, Google News India, this is what actually happened:

Who were the PTI and “The Hindu” fooling? Us or themselves?  By the way, if you think this was just some harmless, non-violent protest, think again:

The Muslim protestors did not take the matter into their stride and what ensued later was mayhem. There was stone-pelting and damage to private vehicles by a huge mob that had gathered near the mosque…The police had to resort to firing tear gas shells and five policemen sustained injuries in the melee. 13 others were injured in the clash.

There is more. From The Indian Express:

At least 15 persons were injured when police resorted to lathicharge to disperse the protesters. Thirty others were said to have sustained minor injuries.

…The demolition was completed in three hours. A crowd gathered there after that and started pelting stones on police personnel. At least 17 private vehicles were damaged. Police fired 11 tear gas shells to scatter the protesters. Five policemen were injured in the melee.

In the spirit of  a picture being worth a thousand words etc, here is a picture of the protest, courtesy AFP via The Hindu:

By way of contrast, here is a picture of another protest by members of a different religion:

I subsequently discovered that the “structure” in Jangpura has a bit of history. There have been seven attempts in the past to have it removed, without much success. From NavBharat Times, this brief extract in Hindi (I’ll try and post a rough translation in a few hours):

जंगपुरा में डीडीए की जमीन पर बने इस अवैध निर्माण की शिकायत चार साल पहले आरडब्ल्यूए ने की थी। जिसके बाद अक्टूबर 2010 में हाई कोर्ट ने इसे गिराने के निर्देश दिए थे। डीडीए ने करीब सात बार कोशिश भी की, लेकिन विरोध के कारण पीछे हट गई। कोर्ट ने 14 जनवरी से पहले अवैध निर्माण ढहाने के ऑर्डर दिए और कहा कि अगर निर्देश नहीं माने गए तो डीडीए के चेयरमैन यानी उपराज्यपाल के खिलाफ अवमानना का मामला बनेगा। अब जब आखिरी तारीख बहुत करीब थी तो डीडीए ने विरोध की परवाह किए बिना इसे गिरा दिया। डीडीए के डिप्टी डायरेक्टर मंगेज सिंह ने कहा कि डीडीए की जमीन पर अवैध रूप से यह धार्मिक स्ट्रक्चर और बस्ती बसी थी। बस्ती को पहले ही हटा दिया गया था मगर धार्मिक निर्माण को कोई नुकसान नहीं पहुंचाया गया। किसी भी रिलीजियस स्ट्रक्चर के मामले में डीडीए की एक समिति मंजूरी देती है। इस समिति की मंजूरी के बाद अब इसे गिराया गया।

डीडीए के एक वरिष्ठ अधिकारी ने बताया कि रेवेन्यू डिपार्टमेंट के 1927 के रेकॉर्ड के हिसाब से अलीगंज में एक कब्रिस्तान हुआ करता था। यहीं पर मृतक को दफन करने के बाद नमाज पढ़ी जाती थी। लेकिन यहां पर कोई धार्मिक स्थल नहीं था। बाद में लोगों ने उस जगह को ही धार्मिक स्थल कहना शुरू कर दिया और वहां पर इस नाम से अवैध निर्माण कर दिया। वैसे रेकॉर्ड के मुताबिक यह कथित धार्मिक स्थल भी खसरा नंबर 635 में पड़ता है। बुधवार को जो ढांचा गिराया गया वह खसरा नंबर 633 में बना हुआ है। तो यहां वह कथित धार्मिक स्थल भी नहीं हो सकता जिसका दावा किया जा रहा था।

Wait, that is not  the end of the this. Not finished yet. How many of you read this bit of *news today? From “Temple demolished too, but silently” by Mid-Day reporters Abhishek Anand and Shashank Shekhar, this excerpt:

While the brouhaha continued in Jangpura and Nizamuddin, a temple in south Delhi had also come under the hammer of civic agencies.

The demolition squad started work in Pushp Vihar area near Saket at 11am and the process continued till 4pm.  Some protesters opposed the incident but Delhi police managed to control the situation in a short while. Some of the protestors allegedly suffered minor injuries in the incident.

Now you know, why I don’t read the newspapers…

Also read: Of Haj Pilgrims and Unruly Fliers , The “M” Word… and Please, no “M-word” here…

Additional Reading: Hindu temples – now golden goose now street dog – II by Radha Rajan

P.S.  The issue may not be unique to India or to the English language media

* Title of this post inspired by the Superman series.