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As a precarious calm prevails after Tuesday’s violence in North East Bengaluru, many questions still remain unanswered about how a mob of hundreds, managed to mobilise within hours and hold the area to ransom. TNM posed several of these questions to Karnataka home minister Basavaraj Bommai and here's what he had to say.
“After yesterday's incident we have taken firm action. Golibar (firing) was done, three people are dead and a few others injured. 110 people have been arrested and now the situation is under control and there is peace in the area now. Both KG Halli and DJ Halli police stations have been reinforced. Karnataka State Reserve Police (KSRP) also present there.” said Bommai.
Elaborating on the additional security being intensified in sensitive places, the Karnataka Home Minister said, “As a precautionary measure, we are strengthening forces across the state. We have requisitioned the central home ministry for additional forces and they are sending three companies of Central Reserve Police Force(CRPF) from Hyderabad and three from Chennai. We will deploy them in critical and sensitive places.”
When TNM questioned about the identity of the three people who lost their lives and the cause of their deaths, the home minister said he will gather more details on the same once he reaches Bangalore from Mangalore and then update. However, it has been learnt that two people who died are youngsters from the area- Wajid Khan and Yasin Pasha.
Many, including the opposition party in the state have alleged that there was an intelligence failure on part of the government where they were ambushed by the mob who had allegedly come prepared to perpetrate violence. Denying the allegation, Bommai said, “The area is thickly populated with a very high density population. Within minutes, thousands of people can be gathered. This is not the first time something of this nature has taken place in that area.”
The police are trying to determine if people from outside the locality were brought in particularly to create havoc. Meanwhile, the home minister believes that a majority of those involved in the riots were from the same vicinity. “Most of them are from that area; they are locals. There are many notorious criminals in that particular area.”
Speaking about the motive, Bommai said the government suspected local political rivalry to be behind this incident. “There are many political factions also in that area so it culminated in what happened. There are political differences there which lead to this kind of an organised crime.”