RAIPUR: Tension prevailed in Chhattisgarh’s Baloda bazar district where the protest by the Satnami caste followers over the desecration of their place of worship 'Jaitkhamb' near Girodhpuri turned violent on Monday evening.
Satnamis are a notified community in the Scheduled Caste list of the state.
Thousands of Satnami protestors, while demanding a probe by CBI and arrest of culprits pelted stones on the offices of the collector and district panchayat resulting in substantial damages.
They later set on fire the major portions of the collectorate building including the office of the superintendent of police and adjacent important official establishments besides over a hundred vehicles in the area.
The Baloda bazar district administration has imposed Section 144 CrPC to prohibit assembly of five or more individuals in the city.
CM Vishnu Deo Sai summoned a high-level meeting at his official residence to take stock of the massive violence that erupted and continued for nearly two and a half hours. He warned of stringent action against disturbing peace and harmony in the region.
The state home minister Vijay Sharma on Sunday had announced a judicial probe into deliberately damaging the place of worship and appealed to maintain peace and harmony. The police after the registration of an FIR into the desecration incident earlier arrested three but the Satnami community remained discontented and claimed those arrested were not the actual offenders accusing the police of protecting the culprits.
The community had earlier sought permission from the collector and was granted to hold a day-long peaceful demonstration on June 10 in support of their demand.
Ahead of the organised demonstration march, the district police administration had deployed security and barricades were set up to safeguard collector premises and key offices. However, the protestors broke through the barricades, clashed with the police, blocked roads and turned aggressive. Some security personnel were injured in the scuffle.
As the situation turned violent, additional troops were rushed from the adjoining Raipur district.
During the intervening night of 15-16 May, some unidentified miscreants attempted to vandalise the Satnami community’s religious symbol and worship place ‘Jaitkhamb’ (symbol of truth represented by a white flag atop of white painted wooden log) at Bagin gufa, a sacred site few kilometre from Girodhpuri Dham, following which the community had submitted a memorandum to the collector and the police chief of the district.
After the vandalisation attempts, hundreds of Satnami community members have been routinely holding sit-in demonstrations against the incident at Dussehra Maidan close to the collectorate premises seeking strong action and investigation.
They stated that they are aggrieved owing to anti-social elements deliberately trying to hurt the sentiments of the followers of spiritual leader Guru Ghasidas and demanded through probe by CBI and arrests of those involved.