Azad Maidan riot losses recovery on fast track

City Collector Sets Up Team To Put A Figure To Damages

S Ahmed Ali TNN

Feb 12, 2013

    City collector Chandrashekar Oak recently formed a team to ascertain the exact amount of losses incurred due to damage to both public and private property during the August 11, 2012, Azad Maidan riot. The collector will also exercise his powers to hasten the process of recovering the amount.
    The team of five state officials will investigate the actual losses—which the city police have pegged at Rs 2.7 crore—to be recovered from organizers of the rally
that turned violent.
    Two persons were killed and 63 others, mostly policemen, were seriously injured when participants of a rally assembled to protest the alleged atrocities on minorities in Myanmar and Asasam, went on a rampage and ransacked public property.
    The mob mostly damaged BEST buses and vehicles of the fire brigade, the police and the media. They also targeted some private vehicles.
    In December, Oak had served recovery notices to the rally’s organizers under Section 51 of the Bombay Police Act. Sources said that Oak has appointed deputy collector B J Govande of Colaba division and tehsildar Ganesh Sangle and his staff to investigate and prepare a detailed report on the actual losses. “The police had given a rough figure of Rs 2.7 crore. The collector’s team will now prepare a detailed report of the losses and will hold those responsible through legal means,” said a crime branch officer.
    The crime branch probe had pointed at Ahmed Raza of Madina Tul-Ilm, which was the official event organizer. While obtaining permission for the rally from the Azad Maidan police station, Raza had said that around 1,000 persons would assemble to mark their protest. An estimated 15,000 protesters, though, turned up for the rally and took the police by surprise. (See box).
    The crime branch further held three more persons responsible for the riot —Maulana Guddu Bhaiyya from Uttar Pradesh, Maulana Niyamat Noori and Rizwan Khan alias Dayawan from Kurla.
    Bhaiyya and Noori allegedly delivered provocative speeches while Khan has been accused of gathering a large number of people to the ground by financing them and arranging for their transport.
    While the crime branch has already arrested Raza, it is yet to arrest the remaining three.
    Sources said the government is yet to give them the green signal for their arrest.