Riots hit all classes, all faiths

<div class="section1"><div class="Normal">ahmedabad: with great effort, harish parmar limps forward to greet you. a bullet hit his right leg above the knee while he was running away from the mobs torching his house. like harish, three other youngsters are also limping their way to future at a relief camp. they are allegedly shot at by some elements involved in bootlegging, during riots in jamalpur.their woes and worries are similar to those of any other riot-victim at the relief camps. contrary to the popular belief that only members of the minority community are affected by the recent riots, more than 10,000 people belonging to the majority community have also become homeless. the last batch of refugees in fact came in on friday night from the shahpur area. they tried to take shelter in the civil hospital as they had nowhere else to go. volunteers later took them to a relief camp set up in a school in the pritampura area on saturday morning. "there seems to be some confusion about the people affected by the riots. you will not find their names in government rolls because they did not register with district collectorate," says narendra patel, a local relief worker. he said most of the victims have taken refuge at various community sponsored camps. he said the riot-affected majority community families got shelter and support from their own community members and relatives, rather than the government-aided camps. most of these affected families were living as a micro-minority in some of the minority community-dominated areas around the city. hiralal ni chali in jamalpur, nagarvel hanuman in bapunagar, mangal park in amraiwadi, saryudasji mandir at prem darwaja and the municipal school at kankaria are some of the few relief camps filled with members of majority community. "members of majority community, who have been blamed more often for actively supporting hooliganism and triggering post-godhra riots, have actually found themselves at the receiving end," says kalpesh jha, another relief worker at hiralal ni chali in jamalpur, complaining that other side of the story was never heard. around 600 people from municipal quarters have taken refuge in hiralal ki chali near geeta mandir laati bazaar and refused to go back to their houses unless the government made some arrangement for their safety. "you are asking me to venture into lion''s den," retorts paljibhai muljibhai parmar when asked whether he would like to go back to his original place. as many as 106 families belonging to vaghri community were forced to leave their homes when a 2,000-strong crowd torched 70 <span style="" font-style:="" italic="">pucca</span> houses in vaghariwas near prem darwaja. "they looted our property, torched houses, desecrated our temples and later tried to kill us but we escaped somehow," says rameshbhai dantania, camping at suryadasji mandir near prem darwaja, a stone throw away from his house. dantania said that since 1969, there was an srp point to prevent any untoward incident, but this time it was removed and rioting incidents occurred. </div> </div>