'It is 7AM in the morning. The roads are empty. Beside a clogged sewer, a man in his 50s holding a long rod changes to his uniform— a pair of torn shirt and trousers. Rajan*, a sanitation worker in the “Second Best” realty city of India, goes down the sewer everyday with nothing but a rod and a handkerchief on his face. The foul smell emerges from the deep sewer and soon his whole body is covered in black fluid which is the toilet waste of the nearby high class housing societies. He opens the lid of the manhole he is about to crawl into.
'A youth was beaten to death and two others were injured on Tuesday after rumours about Muslim men intentionally spitting to spread the coronavirus led to clashes in Jharkhand’s Gumla district...'
'A Dubai resident has blamed ‘coronavirus paranoia’ for his father’s death in Madhya Pradesh, India, last week. Moeen Ali, 39, said his father Sayyed Aashiq Ali, 65, was suffering from breathlessness caused by a heart ailment yet no private hospital in his hometown would admit him over coronavirus fears.
'Zee News has become the latest organisation to be caught spreading fake news about Tablighi Jamaat. The pro-BJP organisation was forced to delete its tweet containing the fake news after a warning from the Firozabad Police in Uttar Pradesh. In its tweet, now deleted, Zee Uttar Pradesh Uttarakhand had said, “Four Tablighi Jamaati test corona positive in Firozabad, stones pelted at the medical team that came to pick them up.” The Firozabad Police reacted swiftly to expose the lies spread by Zee News...'
'Like the rest of the world, India is battling the coronavirus pandemic. However, here the public conversation over the past week has focussed inordinately on only one facet of the disease: its link with the Tablighi Jamat, a Muslim religious group. A Tablighi Jamat event, held in early March in Delhi, was attended by foreign delegates from South East Asia as well as members from all over India. A few attendees, it later turned out, were coronavirus carriers. When the event finished, many people went back to their home states, carrying the virus with them.
'BJP MP Shobha Karandlaje on Monday took to social media to claim that some people from Belagavi, who were quarantined after they attended the Tablighi Jamaat in New Delhi, were misbehaving and spitting at the healthcare workers of the hospital that they were taken to. However, this claim has been denied by Belagavi Deputy Commissioner SB Bommanahalli, who said that the people quarantined in the district were not spitting or misbehaving with health workers...'
'...Some of them are ration card holders and they brought some free rations. All families shared it and now that too is finished, the youth said, adding that, for the last few days, they have no other option but to take boiled taro leaves as food. The young man also said that, some of them have resorted to begging, but they couldn't get much by begging during this lockdown situation. With the little amount of rice they collect, they use it to feed their children. However, adults are filling up their stomachs with only boiled taro leaves...'
'Unable to find a vehicle amid the nationwide lockdown, a Hindu woman's bier was carried by her Muslim neighbours to a cremation ground in Madhya Pradesh's Indore. The young men also helped the woman's sons with her last rites as most of her relatives did not participate in the funeral due to fears of coronavirus. Videos and photos, that have been widely shared on social media, show the woman's bier being carried by the young men.
'Several families of the Muslim Gujjar (mink selling) community in Hajipur and Talwara blocks of Hoshiarpur district were allegedly beaten by unruly groups in many Hindu majority villages. The Gujjars had to throw hundreds of litres of milk into Swan, a rivulet of the Beas river, amidst their social boycott, as they were also not allowed to leave their mud-house dwellings. Such incidents took place in villages including Tote, Sathwan, Mohri Chakk, Rohli Mor, Kamlooh, Bhatoli and Rajwal, all in the jurisdiction of the Hajipur police station.
'Unable to get access to essential items during the national lockdown despite the Centre’s assurances, an early morning drive with his son-in-law proved deadly for 65-year-old Adivasi man in Madhya Pradesh’s Dhar district on Saturday. Tibu Meda, a resident of Gothaniya in Maheshwar tehsil of Khargone district, and his son-in-law were allegedly beaten up by the police for violating lockdown rules. The incident took place in Gujari village in Dhamnod, Dhar district, when Tibu went out to buy essential items, his son-in-law Sanjay claimed.
