A day after open threats were issued to them, residents of a slum cluster in Palra village of Gurugram’s Sector 70A on Wednesday said most of the families, predominantly from West Bengal, have fled the area. The ones who stayed back live in fear, with some spending the night in a forested area even as the Gurugram police deny any ‘incident’ in the area.
With the flames of the communal violence that began in Mewat region’s Nuh on Monday spreading to Gurugram and other districts of southern Haryana, a mob of members of some right-wing outfits assaulted the slum dwellers in Palra village on Tuesday and told them to “go back where you came from”. Some scrap and tyre puncture shops were also set ablaze in the area at night.
Locals said that nearly 800-900 families live in the slums on rent with most of them employed as garbage collectors, domestic workers, and housekeeping staff in nearby residential societies.
