Source: The Hindu
NEW DELHI, INDIA, March 2, 2002: The communal frenzy in Gujarat that has left around 400 people dead this week had an innocuous but apparently deliberate beginning. According to eyewitnesses, quoted by India Today, the worst communal orgy in the country in a decade was sparked when a Muslim youth “deliberately shouldered” one of the passengers who had alighted from the Sabarmati Express train as it arrived at the Godhra railway station shortly after dawn on February 27. The situation became serious as more people joined in the altercation and, at a signal from the youth, stones started raining on the passenger compartments from a mob that had apparently collected outside in an organized manner, drawing retaliation in kind from the VHP activists. Within minutes, a 500-strong mob attacked three packed coaches of the train with stones, swords and crowbars. They broke open the window grills of one compartment, which had mainly women and children, with the crowbars and hurled petrol bombs and inflammable chemicals inside. As flames engulfed the coach, the mob prevented a fire tender from reaching the train. Soon, 50 policemen arrived and dispersed the attackers. By then, 57 people who were trapped in a burning coach had charred to death. They included 25 women and 14 children.