The following piece has been sent to us by a friend of ours. He recieved it from one of his relatives whose entire family subscribes to the Hindutva philosophy. The fact that even he has felt compelled to convey all these details of what really happened at Godhra is indicative of the enormity of the problem posed by the VHP and its associates in Gujarat. Those referred to as kar sevaks have now been rechristened as Ram sevaks. —Editor

The tragic incident of Sabarmati Express that occured at about one kilometre away from Godhra railway station has thrown a question-mark to those people who claim to be secular or liberal. Many aspects and facts have been ignored which I would like to bring to your notice. Compartment no. S-6 and two other compartments of the Sabarmati Express were carrying the kar sevaks of the VHP. And it was due to these kar sevaks from compartment no. S-6 that the incident occurred.

The actual story didn’t start at Godhra as is being told everywhere but it started from a place Daahod, 75 kilometres before the Godhra railway station. At about 5.30 to 6.00 am the train reached the Daahod railway station. These kar sevaks, after having tea and snacks at the railway stall, broke down the stall following some argument with the stall owner and they proceeded back to the departing train. The stall owner then filed an NC against the kar sevaks at the local police station about the above incident.
Then about 7.00 or 7.15 am the train reached the Godhra railway station. All the kar sevaks came out from their reserved compartments and started to have tea and snacks at the small tea stall on the platform, which was being run by an old bearded man from the minority community. There was a servant helping this old man in the stall. The kar sevaks on purpose argued with this old man and then beat him up and pulled his beard. This was all planned to humiliate the old man since he was from the minority community. These kar sevaks kept repeating the slogan, ‘Mandir ka nirmaan karo, Babar ki aulad ko bahar karo’ (Start building the Mandir and throw the sons of Babar—that is, the Muslims—out of the country).

Hearing the chaos, the daughter (16) of the old man who was also present at the station came forward and tried to save her father from the kar sevaks. She kept pleading and begging to them to stop beating her father and leave him alone. But instead of listening to her pleadings, the kar sevaks lifted the young girl and took her inside their compartment (S-6) and closed the compartment door shut. The train started to move out of the platform of the Godhra railway station. The old man kept banging on the compartment doors with the plea to leave his daughter. Just before the train could move out completely from the platform, two stall vendors jumped into the last bogey that comes after the guard cabin. And with the intention of saving the girl they pulled the chain and stopped the train. By the time the train halted completely, it was one kilometre away from the railway station. These two men then come to the bogey in which the girl was and started to bang the door and requested the kar sevaks to leave the girl alone. Hearing all these developments, people in the vicinity near the tracks started to move towards the train. The boys and the mob (that also included women) that had now gathered near the compartment requested the kar sevaks to return the girl. But instead of returning the girl, they started closing their windows. This infuriated the mob and they retaliated by pelting stones at the compartment.
 

The compartments adjoining compartment S-6 on both sides contained the kar sevaks of the VHP. These kar sevaks were carrying banners that had long bamboo sticks attached to them. These kar sevaks got down and started attacking with those bamboo sticks on the mob gathered to save the girl. This was like adding insult to injury to the crowd gathered and their anger was now uncontrollable. The crowd started to bring diesel and petrol from trucks and rickshaws standing at the garages in Signal Fadia (a place in Godhra) and burnt down the compartment. They didn’t bring the fuel from any petrol pump as has been reported everywhere nor was this act of burning pre-planned as is being mentioned by many people but it happened all of a sudden out of sheer frustration and anger.

After hearing about this incident the members of the VHP living in that area started burning down the garages in Signal Fadia; they also burnt down Baddshah Masjid at Shehra Bhagaad (a small area in Godhra).

Reliable sources have reported all this information and these facts cannot be doubted. The journalists who have worked hard to unearth these facts deserve praise for their hard work.
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SOURCE: March 30, 2002 Mainstream