For a community in Ullaibettu, it isn’t communal fault lines that are driving them to squat in front of their houses in fear. It is the police, who in their midnight ‘vigil’ on the village, are alleged to have forced themselves into 25 houses and taken the young men into questioning.
After group violence in the main road, residents said a posse of policemen descended on the town, around 20 km from Mangaluru, and began their “sweep” around 2 p.m. Most residents who talked to The Hindu said they were sleeping at the time when the police began knocking at their doors. By the end of the sweep, two lanes by the Ullaibettu junction bore a string of broken doors.
“We heard the doorbells. By the time we could get up and come at the door, around 20 policemen had knocked it down and began rounding up the young men,” said Abdul Khader, a resident.
Jainabbu (60) was alone in her tiled-roof house when policemen broke through her door and accused her of sheltering men, she said in tears. Further up the lane, doors of all 12 houses in an apartment were broken – even one house where no one stayed. In a house where eight women stay, the residents accused the “abusive” police of entering at 3 a.m., pushing them aside, and threatening to arrest them. Police are accused of ransacked belongings and cupboards.
By sunrise, over 28 people from the village were taken from their houses for questioning. “When the ones supposed to be protecting us start to torment us, where do we go,” said Ibrahim.
ReactionCity Police Commissioner R. Hitendra said the police had the right to enter the houses during “searches”.
“When people do not cooperate with us by opening the door, we have the right to use force and enter…There is no need for a warrant in non-cognizable cases such as these,” he said.
On the accusation that the police did not wait for the doors to be open, Mr. Hitendra said, “This is just their version of events. They did not cooperate.”
