Regardless of the hardships that the myriad number of families will suffer as a repercussion, the Uttarakhand High Court has released an order to clear the area adjacent to Haldwani Railway Station where thousands of families have been living for decades. It is said that the order was released last week allegedly without mentioning a word of rehabilitation of the families of which mostly are Muslims.
Spread over 29 acres of area, this Muslim dominated residential quarter is called Ghafoor Basti located in Banbhoolpura area near the railway station. Apart from houses, the area accommodates schools, commercial complexes and a few mosques that make it a complete Muslim ghetto close to the railway station.
A division bench of Uttarakhand High Court instructed the concerned authorities to demolish the unauthorised structures in Ghafoor Basti area with just a one week notice time. It is said that the order will leave over 4300 families displaced from their houses wherein most of them belong to Muslim community.
Shattered over the way they have been asked to vacate their houses – where they are living for decades, following the release of the order, the families living in Ghafoor Basti, as it famously known, held a protest against the order which they believe is against the nature of the law and atrocious.
The protest, that saw the huge presence of Burqa cladding Muslim women went on for four hours wherein the women urged the government to withdraw the order that, if implemented, will leave a catastrophic impact over their lives which were already shattered ever since the order was released.
“Displacing us from our houses will render us all homeless. Besides it will leave a catastrophic impact over the future of our school going children,” bemoaned a protester. It is also learned that the residents of Banbhoolpura were told to surrender their licensed weapons before the administration last week.
The protesters, in wicked weather, have offered prayer at the protest site seeking divine blessings for an amicable solution of the issue as they believe that the administration is hell-bent on displacing them from their houses where they have been living for decades.
