Ahmedabad, May 27: Nine people have been arrested in connection with the communal riots broke out Monday here, a senior police official said on Thursday.
“Twelve cases have been registered in connection with the riots, and nine persons have been arrested while five have been put under preventive arrest,” Joint Commissioner of Police (JCP) Satish Sharma told reporters.
“Since Monday the city had been witnessing violence in Shahpur locality which has traditionally been a communally sensitive area. But the situation today is fairly under control,” the officer said.
Riots had broken out on Monday here over a controversy between participants of a marriage procession and locals when procession was passing near a mosque and it was time for evening prayers, police have said.
“One person has died, while 22 others, including 10 policemen were injured in the stone pelting incidents in the last three days,” Sharma said.
The JCP said police fired 22 rounds of bullets and lobbed 180 tear gas shells to bring the situation under control.
“Six companies of State Reserve Police (SRP), two Rapid Action Force (RAF) and over 800 police jawans have been deployed in the Shahpur and nearby areas,” he said, adding that there were couple of similar incidents in Kalupur and Madhupura areas also.
Sharma said that they were trying to ascertain if the riots were engineered or was a spontaneous act.
“We are investigating how the entire thing began and who were involved in it. We are also probing if the riots were engineered or not. So far we have not got any indication which could suggest that they were engineered,” Sharma said.
When asked if any of the local politicians or corporators were involved in inciting the crowd, Sharma said that they have no such information.
About the stabbing incidents that took place yesterday, he said that they have got information about the suspects and are trying to trace them.
“We have lead on the people who were involved in the riots and are looking for those notorious miscreants who are on the run. They will be caught soon,” he said.
—PTI—