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Tuesday,
April 23, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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Police opens fire, 3 killed
Ahmedabad, April 22 The police fired several rounds and burst tear gas shells to disperse mob engaged in stone throwing and arson in the Shahpur and Behrampura areas. With the three deaths, the toll in the violence in the city since yesterday has gone up to 24. Meanwhile, hutments belonging to people of two different communities were set on fire by mobs in Khanpur and on the embankment of the Sabarmati, falling under the limits of Shahpur police station, according to fire brigade sources. The Army was deployed at 7.30 am today to keep a check on any untoward incident, the police said. Two more companies of the Rapid Action Force (RAF) and Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) were also deployed in the affected areas of the city, they said. As many as 125 persons received injuries in large-scale violence in the Gomtipur, Bapunagar and Rakhiyal areas of the city, Kadi town of Mehsana district and Kapadvanj and Mehmdabad of Kheda district since yesterday, the police said, adding that curfew continued in all the trouble-torn areas. At least 17 persons were killed, 13 of them in police firing, yesterday and over 100 injured over the past two days here and at Kheda and Mehsana districts in the state. In Ahmedabad, the police fired 633 rounds and burst 382 tear gas shells to contain the violence in city areas till late last night. Adequate security arrangements have been made to enable school and college students to appear for the ongoing examinations, the police added. According to a UNI report, tension prevailed here following yesterday’s violence, which left 16 dead and more than 125 injured even as the board examinations of 10th and 12th standard students continued peacefully in the state. Despite all the tension and indefinite curfew in three police stations more than 95 per cent appeared for the Standard X examinations. Of the total 1.01 lakh students 96,881 students took the examinations this morning. VADODARA: A city court has issued a notice to Delhi-based Jama Masjid’s Shahi Imam Syed Ahmed Bukhari to personally appear before the court for his allegedly highly provocative statement at the Friday prayer meeting at the mosque.
PTI, UNI |
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Lay off Gujarat, says MEA New Delhi, April 22 Ostensibly in reaction to a remark of the visiting Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja in which he talked about Gujarat in an interview to an Indian English daily, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) today made it clear that “it does not appreciate interference in its internal affairs” by such people in order to “pander to their domestic lobbies.” Actually, the MEA’s reaction to the Finnish Foreign Minister’s remarks has a much larger and loftier goal. Well-placed sources here made it clear today that it was a well thought out strategy of the Vajpayee government to send a generic message to the world that New Delhi would not tolerate interference in India’s internal affairs. The MEA is also understood to have shot off advisories to its 150-odd diplomatic missions worldwide suggesting to them to go on diplomatic offensive in explaining the Indian government’s stand on the issue of the Gujarat carnage in which hundreds of people have been killed in unabated communal frenzy. Only recently, a team of British diplomats from their embassy here had gone to Gujarat and had prepared an adverse report. More importantly, much to the embarrassment of the MEA the report had been leaked to a major Indian daily. Mea spokesperson, while disclosing that India had lodged an official protest with Finland, today said: “We would like to make it clear that India does not appreciate interference in our internal affairs including utilisation of the Indian media by foreign leaders as well as by visiting dignitaries to make public statements in order to pander to their domestic lobbies.” Finnish Foreign Minister Tuomioja had said that the happenings in Gujarat were a matter of great concern and that the “pictures of carnage are very disturbing”. India is also likely to take up shortly with the European Union a document issued by it where it has reportedly observed that the carnage in Gujarat was a kind of apartheid and Nazis having parallels with Germany of the 1930s. |
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Oppn stalls House proceedings New Delhi, April 22 Opposition members were on their feet as soon as the two Houses assembled protesting against the renewed round of killings which occurred in the state over the past few days. There was no let up even from the Treasury Benches as the members raised slogans against the Congress. In the Lok Sabha, members from the Congress, the Left, the Samajwadi Party, the RJD and the Muslim League stormed the well as soon as Deputy Speaker P.M. Sayeed took the Chair protesting renewed killings in Gujarat. They made a strong plea for a discussion under Rule 184 which entails voting. The ruling BJP members were also in no mood to let the opposition have an upper hand and countered the onslaught by shouting slogans like “Congress ka khooni panja, hai hai (Down with the killer Congress hand — election symbol)”. Amid din, Mr Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi demanded the immediate resignation of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi holding him responsible for the continuing communal violence in the state. The ruling party members retorted that the Congress also had a hand in the communal violence. As charges and counter-charges were traded by Opposition and ruling Benches, TDP leader K. Yerrannaidu again sought to make a statement on the Gujarat issue. The TDP, which had demanded the removal of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, has not taken any particular stand regarding a discussion on the situation in the state. |
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