09-16-2006, 06:52 AM
(This post was last modified: 09-16-2006, 07:03 AM by Bharatvarsh.)
Notice how the author takes a pro Jihadi line and completely underestimates Hindu casualties and Muslim barabarism:
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->'The Garhmukteswar Massacre'
Sir Francis Tuker
Courtesy: While Memory Serves
(London: Cassell, 1950), pp. 195-202
The tale of horror now takes us northwards into the United Provinces.
This terrible deed is marked by the savagery of the Jat men who did the brutal work and, some say, by the cold-blooded fact that the affair was previously planned. I am not certain if the latter fact is true but there may be others who know better than I. I think that Jat men did go to the fair all ready for trouble and particularly ready because this was the time of the Muslim Bakr Id when cows are killed and sacrificed, but I do not think that they came in organized bands or with a complete scheme for their dreadful work. Let it be remembered that this massacre was in the main the crime of Jats from about Rohtak and Hissar. These Jats are the same Hindu men from whom we have for years enlisted sepoys into Indian regiments. It seems that beneath the discipline which has been the cause of their good behaviour in the Army there yet remains a horrid vein of inhuman, merciless ferocity.
Eagerly enough the local Hindus joined in where they could, even to guiding them to and singling out the poor huts in which Muslim families dwelt, unsuspecting little families with whom these treacherous guides had but yesterday jested and held friendly intercourse.
In the days of British administration supervision of the Garhmukteswar1 fair was regarded as a test for a young police officer, but the test was mainly to see that the simple and devout pilgrims did not in their zeal succeed in drowning themselves in their own Ganges.
One festival had passed quietly by, the Hindu Dewali, and the third day of the Bakr Id had come, seemingly with peace. But communal relations were becoming increasingly bad, the result of all the tales, oral and newspaper, coming upwards along the valley of the Ganges from Calcutta and Noakhali, through Bihar to the United Provinces and to Garhmukteswar where the annual Hindu fair is held. The Calcutta killing had been heavy but even for both sides: in East Bengal the Hindu casualties had been far heavier than the Muslim but the affair, judged by our now accustomed eyes, had been a small one, the Hindu killed numbering some two hundred over a wide expanse of country.
In Bihar the Hindu legions descended on the few Muslims and wiped them out, leaving about seven thousand dead. Hitherto the game had mostly gone in favour of the Hindus: it was hardly to be expected that they would seek for any further revenge and it seemed that perhaps their thirst for blood might by now have been assuaged.
Here at Garhmukteswar there was no provocation.
I have been told that it was strange how few of the facts of this orgy leaked out then or later. There was, of course, the Government of India's ban on news which was likely to exacerbate communal feeling: any sort of abuse could be flung at the British who were not prone to object or to become any less cordial towards the abuser's party, but nothing could be written that was irritating to either community.
Despite this 'stop' on atrocity stories it has yet seemed to us that someone quickly clamped down on this massacre a strong, impenetrable screen of censorship through which nothing could reach the outside world. The provincial government, willingly helped by its Indian administrators, soft-pedalled these outrages committed by Hindus, and the Hindu papers purposely emphasised the far smaller acts of retaliation by Muslims in the area of the disturbances, in order to cover up the misdeeds of their Hindu co-religionists. I am told that editions of the Delhi Muslim newspaper Dawn containing stories of the outbreak were completely bought up by wealthy Hindu party men as the newspapers came off the train at .Meerut, and that this paper disappeared from the tables of British officials at Lucknow for a period of ten days. So here at last is some account of this holocaust to the gods, to the cow, of the Hindu. Even now it is not easy to glean all the details of the thing that was done in the autumn sunshine and under the bright stars of those October days and nights by the banks of Mother Ganges.
During the early days of November the platforms of Delhi Junction were littered day by day with an ever increasing medley of eager Hindu pilgrims coming in to Garhmukteswar for the annual fair and for their ritual immersion in the Ganges. There they lay, men, women and delighted children, nodding on the dappled, sun-drowsy platform with no intent but to reach their bourne and to be shriven for another year. Not far short of a million of the devout came in from the United Provinces and the Punjab, among them large numbers of Jat peasants.
To cater for their needs and to profit themselves numbers of Muslims, men, women and children, came into the mela (fair) from Muradabad and Bareilly to set up stalls and to peddle their wares through the ten-mile long fair grounds speckling the sandy islands in the midst of Gangaji (Holy Ganges). In Garhmukteswar itself there lived some two to three thousand Muslims while about the neighbourhood their communities were scattered in different localities. It is unbelievable that living in Garhmukteswar today there are still Muslims, even after the happenings of which they were the wretched martyrs and of which I shall now tell.
On the evening of the 6th November 1946, at a side-show run by Muslims, there was a motor-cycling display called 'The Wall of Death'. There was a fair crowd watching when a Muslim performer threw a jest to a Jatni2 woman spectator, probably one from Rohtak. A sudden shout went up that a Muslim had insulted a Hindu woman. At once on this alarm a number of small bands of Jats rushed out and, in concerted fashion, set to work to massacre the Muslim stallholders at the mela, spattered all about the fair grounds quietly plying their trade. Practically every Muslim man, woman and child was murdered with appalling cruelty. Either here or later even pregnant women were ripped up, their unborn babies torn out and the infants' brains bashed out on walls and on the ground. There was rape, and women and children were seized by the legs by burly fiends and torn apart. These hellions looted and burnt the show, casting the dead and dying into the flames. Most were killed wjth spears but some of the killings were by strangulation which, it will be recalled, was the ritual method of the Thugs. The murderers' women stood about, laughing with glee at the burning booths, egging on their menfolk.
Throughout these days the Hindus of Garhmukteswar town never lifted a hand to stop the savagery against Muslims nor raised a voice in protest against Jat excesses. The killing, let it be said now, stopped solely because the Muslim men, women and children were either dead or had run away. There were police present in sufficient numbers to put up a stout resistance to the rioters, if not to stop them altogether. Nevertheless only on the mela ground, and that half-heartedly, did the police make any effort to interfere. They were afraid rather than apathetic. Unfortunately there was not a single British police officer in control of the area of the trouble. The Senior Superintendent of Police, the District Magistrate and the Superintendent of Police were all Hindus. It was generally remarked in the Bihar massacre that wherever there was a British District Magistrate the rioting was quickly controlled or never occurred at all.
The next day a large body of these same Rohtak Jats, mingling with pilgrims on the traffic-choked, two-mile long road, led by local Hindus, left the fair grounds and entered Garhmukteswar town. All of a sudden they fell upon the Muslim quarter of the town, slaughtering with disgusting brutality all Muslim men, women and children. Women were raped and murdered and the houses burnt. The rest of the terrified inhabitants fled.
Through the high-walled, narrow streets the mob rushed, howling like beasts for blood, past the tall crumbling red brick walls and up the hill into the hospital compound. The Muslim District Medical Officer was killed, his Assistant and his wife. All Muslims attending for treatment they slaughtered on the spot. A Muslim doctor was murdered and his wife raped there and then. Thereafter she was paraded naked in triumph through the town. Somehow she escaped and with one arm broken waded the now desecrated Ganges and collapsed in safety on the far side.
Official estimates of dead sought later to minimise the slaughter. Besides the dead there were many who escaped with more or less terrible injuries.
The police, of whom there were some two dozen fully-armed men within a hundred yards of this latest scene, did nothing, apart from four policemen entering the town, firing over the heads of the mob and then again subsiding into inaction. The carnage went on despite their cowardly and ineffective effort.
The mob, tired out, quitted Garhmukteswar but returned that night. The police, probably for self-preservation only, opened fire and the mob retired. The Hindu Station Officer with the main force of police at the police station on the road, lifted not one finger throughout: the police at the mela outpost were informed of the killing but said that it was not in their responsibility, so they too did nothing. The only intervention was by four policemen and those were too timid to affect the situation.
News of this disturbance soon spread to the villages and to Meerut. In the latter place isolated stabbings started and went on in desultory fashion for the next fortnight. Out in the countryside trouble came with the dispersal of the pilgrims from the fair. At one place, Shahjehanpur, Muslims set to work to exact retribution by stopping some of the returning bullock carts, killing thirty Hindus-men, women and children. It was a dastardly act but at least they were all killed outright with no attendant atrocity such as their opponents had committed. It is a fact that the Muslims, for some reason or other, showed unexpected restraint in the extent of their retaliation. It may have been that they were dazed by the speed with which peace and amity had been turned into conflict and hatred, or else that they held back from provoking the majority community to further atrocities against themselves.
One of the most cruel of all these widespread horrors was the smaller Jat attack of the 10th November on the village of Harson near Ghaziabad where about forty Muslims-men, women, and as now seemed so horribly usual, children were atrociously massacred.
The isolated stabbings continued in Meerut and thence disturbances spread to Rohtak in the Punjab.
By the 15th November the pilgrims had passed on their locust-stricken way leaving devastation behind them and the peace of the desert reigned on smoking village and bereaved children.
I was never able to find out the casualties. The Indian administration minimised them and the whole affair. It is certain that one thousand Muslims died, perhaps two thousand.
Why did the few living not flee for ever from their smouldering homes? There was nowhere for them to go. All around were these same blood-thirsty enemies. They returned to await in the Devil's good time their inevitable end, death at the hands of their enemies or the eternal slavery of a scheduled caste. There seemed no hope for them nor for others of their co-religionists in the United Provinces and in Eastern Punjab.
Little of this terrible story ever reached the ears of the public outside-none went to England or to America. There was good reason why it should not.
Later on, bit by bit, we discovered that a good many Hindus knew of the impending tragedy. A certain Hindu officer-not under Eastern Command at the time-whose home is in Meerut, told one of my officers that he had known that the massacre was planned and had advised his friends not to attend the fair. He had not reported this warning to the military authorities as he thought all others knew of the plan. He then mentioned the name of a certain Indian provincial official who, he said, was fully aware of the coming horror. However, I am not certain that this was not a general local project of which he had heard and not one prepared by the Rohtak Jats.
Pandit Pant, Prime Minister of the United Provinces, later announced in Council that there would be a judicial enquiry into the affair. None was held.
On the 11Ith November the Regimental Centre of the Royal Garhwal Rifles, responding to a call from the civil authorities, despatched into Bijnor a column 15° strong with a band, to keep the peace in the districts abutting on Garhmukteswar. The column toured the district, their attentions being greatly appreciated by the local inhabitants, as these two letters, copied as written, testify:
Collector.
Sir,
The superintendent of Police visited the town Dhampur with Military forces yesterday on 15/11/46. All Military officers along with their forces marched throughout the town with band. Their demonstration was very much appreciated by the public. It proved very effective for suppressing the communal tension, which spread in the town due to the recent dispute at Garhmukteswar. Both Hindus and Muslims took part in the demonstration and welcomed -the S.P. and the Military forces. The S.D.O. also joined the demonstration on his way to Sherkot from Nehtor. Tehsildar, N. Tehsildar and S. a. Dhampur helped me at all times for making the demonstration successful. This visit gave a good influence over the Gundas, and I am glad to inform you that there was not the least panic in the town since the visit of the Military. Ion behalf of public am thankful for the arrangements you have made for our sake.
I am also thankful to the Superintendent of Police, and the Military Officers who took pains in moving about throughout the city, on foot with the forces.
Sd.-
Chairman
N. B. Dhampur
16/11/46
Collector.
Sir,
The Superintendent of Police came in the town with a large number of Military forces, and made a round throughout the town. The Military officers along with the Military Forces marched in the town of Dhampur, with band on 15/11/46. The marching was very much appreciated by the public, and crowds of people co-operated in demonstration. Gentry of Dhampur welcomed the arrival of the Military, and they made their party at Ejaz hall Dhampur. The visit of Military effected (sic) the panic tension which was spreading in the town due to the recent dispute at Garhmukteswar and the Gundas have been influenced. The situation has been turned since their arrival and there was not the least panic last night.
Submitted for information.
Sd.-
Tehsildar
Dhampur
16/11/46
So the people were glad to have been saved from themselves. On the 5th December the Garhwalis were out again, this time making in haste for Chandpur where a fierce riot had broken out. Muslims, towing Taziyas3 in their Muharram procession, clambered over the roofs of houses, whether Hindu or Muslim. Hindus at once took strong objection and fighting started. Three Hindus were killed and forty-five others, mostly Hindus, injured. The police had acted promptly and twice opened fire, dispersing the crowds. But there was every sign that neither side had yet had enough when the soldiers accompanied by some armed police drove into the town and spread out on patrol through the streets.
On the 7th December they were cordoning off a nearby village for police to search, seize looted articles and make arrests, thereafter flag-marching through the countryside.
Their watch and ward continued by night and day until the 18th December when a company of the Indian Grenadiers relieved them.
We heard no more of Garhmukteswar .
Notes:
See Map No.5, p. 197.
Of the Jat race
Tall ornamented emblems.
http://www.globalwebpost.com/farooqm/study...m_massacre.html<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It is astonishing that he has the audacity to claim that Hindu casualties in East Bengal numbered 200 hundred, in reality they numbered in the thousands, according to some estimates 120,000 Hindus were slaughtered in Noakhali alone (the slaughter was on such a scale that the normally Pro Muslim Gandhi went to Noakhali), add in the Tipperah estimates and you will get the true picture, so there goes ben ami's myths about East Bengali Hindus leaving peacefully.
The whole article is in line with British whitewashing of Muslim deeds under their rule and blaming Hindus and now the chickens are coming home to roost. Of course the great white man (British officer) would have saved the day but funnily enough the same British officers never lifted a finger when Hindus and Sikhs were being slaughtered by the millions in Pakiland.
If you ever read these partition articles you will notice that 3 or 4 communities are conveniently made the scapegoats, Sikhs, Hindu Jats, Biharis and UP people.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->'The Garhmukteswar Massacre'
Sir Francis Tuker
Courtesy: While Memory Serves
(London: Cassell, 1950), pp. 195-202
The tale of horror now takes us northwards into the United Provinces.
This terrible deed is marked by the savagery of the Jat men who did the brutal work and, some say, by the cold-blooded fact that the affair was previously planned. I am not certain if the latter fact is true but there may be others who know better than I. I think that Jat men did go to the fair all ready for trouble and particularly ready because this was the time of the Muslim Bakr Id when cows are killed and sacrificed, but I do not think that they came in organized bands or with a complete scheme for their dreadful work. Let it be remembered that this massacre was in the main the crime of Jats from about Rohtak and Hissar. These Jats are the same Hindu men from whom we have for years enlisted sepoys into Indian regiments. It seems that beneath the discipline which has been the cause of their good behaviour in the Army there yet remains a horrid vein of inhuman, merciless ferocity.
Eagerly enough the local Hindus joined in where they could, even to guiding them to and singling out the poor huts in which Muslim families dwelt, unsuspecting little families with whom these treacherous guides had but yesterday jested and held friendly intercourse.
In the days of British administration supervision of the Garhmukteswar1 fair was regarded as a test for a young police officer, but the test was mainly to see that the simple and devout pilgrims did not in their zeal succeed in drowning themselves in their own Ganges.
One festival had passed quietly by, the Hindu Dewali, and the third day of the Bakr Id had come, seemingly with peace. But communal relations were becoming increasingly bad, the result of all the tales, oral and newspaper, coming upwards along the valley of the Ganges from Calcutta and Noakhali, through Bihar to the United Provinces and to Garhmukteswar where the annual Hindu fair is held. The Calcutta killing had been heavy but even for both sides: in East Bengal the Hindu casualties had been far heavier than the Muslim but the affair, judged by our now accustomed eyes, had been a small one, the Hindu killed numbering some two hundred over a wide expanse of country.
In Bihar the Hindu legions descended on the few Muslims and wiped them out, leaving about seven thousand dead. Hitherto the game had mostly gone in favour of the Hindus: it was hardly to be expected that they would seek for any further revenge and it seemed that perhaps their thirst for blood might by now have been assuaged.
Here at Garhmukteswar there was no provocation.
I have been told that it was strange how few of the facts of this orgy leaked out then or later. There was, of course, the Government of India's ban on news which was likely to exacerbate communal feeling: any sort of abuse could be flung at the British who were not prone to object or to become any less cordial towards the abuser's party, but nothing could be written that was irritating to either community.
Despite this 'stop' on atrocity stories it has yet seemed to us that someone quickly clamped down on this massacre a strong, impenetrable screen of censorship through which nothing could reach the outside world. The provincial government, willingly helped by its Indian administrators, soft-pedalled these outrages committed by Hindus, and the Hindu papers purposely emphasised the far smaller acts of retaliation by Muslims in the area of the disturbances, in order to cover up the misdeeds of their Hindu co-religionists. I am told that editions of the Delhi Muslim newspaper Dawn containing stories of the outbreak were completely bought up by wealthy Hindu party men as the newspapers came off the train at .Meerut, and that this paper disappeared from the tables of British officials at Lucknow for a period of ten days. So here at last is some account of this holocaust to the gods, to the cow, of the Hindu. Even now it is not easy to glean all the details of the thing that was done in the autumn sunshine and under the bright stars of those October days and nights by the banks of Mother Ganges.
During the early days of November the platforms of Delhi Junction were littered day by day with an ever increasing medley of eager Hindu pilgrims coming in to Garhmukteswar for the annual fair and for their ritual immersion in the Ganges. There they lay, men, women and delighted children, nodding on the dappled, sun-drowsy platform with no intent but to reach their bourne and to be shriven for another year. Not far short of a million of the devout came in from the United Provinces and the Punjab, among them large numbers of Jat peasants.
To cater for their needs and to profit themselves numbers of Muslims, men, women and children, came into the mela (fair) from Muradabad and Bareilly to set up stalls and to peddle their wares through the ten-mile long fair grounds speckling the sandy islands in the midst of Gangaji (Holy Ganges). In Garhmukteswar itself there lived some two to three thousand Muslims while about the neighbourhood their communities were scattered in different localities. It is unbelievable that living in Garhmukteswar today there are still Muslims, even after the happenings of which they were the wretched martyrs and of which I shall now tell.
On the evening of the 6th November 1946, at a side-show run by Muslims, there was a motor-cycling display called 'The Wall of Death'. There was a fair crowd watching when a Muslim performer threw a jest to a Jatni2 woman spectator, probably one from Rohtak. A sudden shout went up that a Muslim had insulted a Hindu woman. At once on this alarm a number of small bands of Jats rushed out and, in concerted fashion, set to work to massacre the Muslim stallholders at the mela, spattered all about the fair grounds quietly plying their trade. Practically every Muslim man, woman and child was murdered with appalling cruelty. Either here or later even pregnant women were ripped up, their unborn babies torn out and the infants' brains bashed out on walls and on the ground. There was rape, and women and children were seized by the legs by burly fiends and torn apart. These hellions looted and burnt the show, casting the dead and dying into the flames. Most were killed wjth spears but some of the killings were by strangulation which, it will be recalled, was the ritual method of the Thugs. The murderers' women stood about, laughing with glee at the burning booths, egging on their menfolk.
Throughout these days the Hindus of Garhmukteswar town never lifted a hand to stop the savagery against Muslims nor raised a voice in protest against Jat excesses. The killing, let it be said now, stopped solely because the Muslim men, women and children were either dead or had run away. There were police present in sufficient numbers to put up a stout resistance to the rioters, if not to stop them altogether. Nevertheless only on the mela ground, and that half-heartedly, did the police make any effort to interfere. They were afraid rather than apathetic. Unfortunately there was not a single British police officer in control of the area of the trouble. The Senior Superintendent of Police, the District Magistrate and the Superintendent of Police were all Hindus. It was generally remarked in the Bihar massacre that wherever there was a British District Magistrate the rioting was quickly controlled or never occurred at all.
The next day a large body of these same Rohtak Jats, mingling with pilgrims on the traffic-choked, two-mile long road, led by local Hindus, left the fair grounds and entered Garhmukteswar town. All of a sudden they fell upon the Muslim quarter of the town, slaughtering with disgusting brutality all Muslim men, women and children. Women were raped and murdered and the houses burnt. The rest of the terrified inhabitants fled.
Through the high-walled, narrow streets the mob rushed, howling like beasts for blood, past the tall crumbling red brick walls and up the hill into the hospital compound. The Muslim District Medical Officer was killed, his Assistant and his wife. All Muslims attending for treatment they slaughtered on the spot. A Muslim doctor was murdered and his wife raped there and then. Thereafter she was paraded naked in triumph through the town. Somehow she escaped and with one arm broken waded the now desecrated Ganges and collapsed in safety on the far side.
Official estimates of dead sought later to minimise the slaughter. Besides the dead there were many who escaped with more or less terrible injuries.
The police, of whom there were some two dozen fully-armed men within a hundred yards of this latest scene, did nothing, apart from four policemen entering the town, firing over the heads of the mob and then again subsiding into inaction. The carnage went on despite their cowardly and ineffective effort.
The mob, tired out, quitted Garhmukteswar but returned that night. The police, probably for self-preservation only, opened fire and the mob retired. The Hindu Station Officer with the main force of police at the police station on the road, lifted not one finger throughout: the police at the mela outpost were informed of the killing but said that it was not in their responsibility, so they too did nothing. The only intervention was by four policemen and those were too timid to affect the situation.
News of this disturbance soon spread to the villages and to Meerut. In the latter place isolated stabbings started and went on in desultory fashion for the next fortnight. Out in the countryside trouble came with the dispersal of the pilgrims from the fair. At one place, Shahjehanpur, Muslims set to work to exact retribution by stopping some of the returning bullock carts, killing thirty Hindus-men, women and children. It was a dastardly act but at least they were all killed outright with no attendant atrocity such as their opponents had committed. It is a fact that the Muslims, for some reason or other, showed unexpected restraint in the extent of their retaliation. It may have been that they were dazed by the speed with which peace and amity had been turned into conflict and hatred, or else that they held back from provoking the majority community to further atrocities against themselves.
One of the most cruel of all these widespread horrors was the smaller Jat attack of the 10th November on the village of Harson near Ghaziabad where about forty Muslims-men, women, and as now seemed so horribly usual, children were atrociously massacred.
The isolated stabbings continued in Meerut and thence disturbances spread to Rohtak in the Punjab.
By the 15th November the pilgrims had passed on their locust-stricken way leaving devastation behind them and the peace of the desert reigned on smoking village and bereaved children.
I was never able to find out the casualties. The Indian administration minimised them and the whole affair. It is certain that one thousand Muslims died, perhaps two thousand.
Why did the few living not flee for ever from their smouldering homes? There was nowhere for them to go. All around were these same blood-thirsty enemies. They returned to await in the Devil's good time their inevitable end, death at the hands of their enemies or the eternal slavery of a scheduled caste. There seemed no hope for them nor for others of their co-religionists in the United Provinces and in Eastern Punjab.
Little of this terrible story ever reached the ears of the public outside-none went to England or to America. There was good reason why it should not.
Later on, bit by bit, we discovered that a good many Hindus knew of the impending tragedy. A certain Hindu officer-not under Eastern Command at the time-whose home is in Meerut, told one of my officers that he had known that the massacre was planned and had advised his friends not to attend the fair. He had not reported this warning to the military authorities as he thought all others knew of the plan. He then mentioned the name of a certain Indian provincial official who, he said, was fully aware of the coming horror. However, I am not certain that this was not a general local project of which he had heard and not one prepared by the Rohtak Jats.
Pandit Pant, Prime Minister of the United Provinces, later announced in Council that there would be a judicial enquiry into the affair. None was held.
On the 11Ith November the Regimental Centre of the Royal Garhwal Rifles, responding to a call from the civil authorities, despatched into Bijnor a column 15° strong with a band, to keep the peace in the districts abutting on Garhmukteswar. The column toured the district, their attentions being greatly appreciated by the local inhabitants, as these two letters, copied as written, testify:
Collector.
Sir,
The superintendent of Police visited the town Dhampur with Military forces yesterday on 15/11/46. All Military officers along with their forces marched throughout the town with band. Their demonstration was very much appreciated by the public. It proved very effective for suppressing the communal tension, which spread in the town due to the recent dispute at Garhmukteswar. Both Hindus and Muslims took part in the demonstration and welcomed -the S.P. and the Military forces. The S.D.O. also joined the demonstration on his way to Sherkot from Nehtor. Tehsildar, N. Tehsildar and S. a. Dhampur helped me at all times for making the demonstration successful. This visit gave a good influence over the Gundas, and I am glad to inform you that there was not the least panic in the town since the visit of the Military. Ion behalf of public am thankful for the arrangements you have made for our sake.
I am also thankful to the Superintendent of Police, and the Military Officers who took pains in moving about throughout the city, on foot with the forces.
Sd.-
Chairman
N. B. Dhampur
16/11/46
Collector.
Sir,
The Superintendent of Police came in the town with a large number of Military forces, and made a round throughout the town. The Military officers along with the Military Forces marched in the town of Dhampur, with band on 15/11/46. The marching was very much appreciated by the public, and crowds of people co-operated in demonstration. Gentry of Dhampur welcomed the arrival of the Military, and they made their party at Ejaz hall Dhampur. The visit of Military effected (sic) the panic tension which was spreading in the town due to the recent dispute at Garhmukteswar and the Gundas have been influenced. The situation has been turned since their arrival and there was not the least panic last night.
Submitted for information.
Sd.-
Tehsildar
Dhampur
16/11/46
So the people were glad to have been saved from themselves. On the 5th December the Garhwalis were out again, this time making in haste for Chandpur where a fierce riot had broken out. Muslims, towing Taziyas3 in their Muharram procession, clambered over the roofs of houses, whether Hindu or Muslim. Hindus at once took strong objection and fighting started. Three Hindus were killed and forty-five others, mostly Hindus, injured. The police had acted promptly and twice opened fire, dispersing the crowds. But there was every sign that neither side had yet had enough when the soldiers accompanied by some armed police drove into the town and spread out on patrol through the streets.
On the 7th December they were cordoning off a nearby village for police to search, seize looted articles and make arrests, thereafter flag-marching through the countryside.
Their watch and ward continued by night and day until the 18th December when a company of the Indian Grenadiers relieved them.
We heard no more of Garhmukteswar .
Notes:
See Map No.5, p. 197.
Of the Jat race
Tall ornamented emblems.
http://www.globalwebpost.com/farooqm/study...m_massacre.html<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It is astonishing that he has the audacity to claim that Hindu casualties in East Bengal numbered 200 hundred, in reality they numbered in the thousands, according to some estimates 120,000 Hindus were slaughtered in Noakhali alone (the slaughter was on such a scale that the normally Pro Muslim Gandhi went to Noakhali), add in the Tipperah estimates and you will get the true picture, so there goes ben ami's myths about East Bengali Hindus leaving peacefully.
The whole article is in line with British whitewashing of Muslim deeds under their rule and blaming Hindus and now the chickens are coming home to roost. Of course the great white man (British officer) would have saved the day but funnily enough the same British officers never lifted a finger when Hindus and Sikhs were being slaughtered by the millions in Pakiland.
If you ever read these partition articles you will notice that 3 or 4 communities are conveniently made the scapegoats, Sikhs, Hindu Jats, Biharis and UP people.