A school bus carrying children became a target of a mob in Quazi Palasiya of Khudel area of Indore, Madhya Pradesh after a goat was hit by the bus. The children kept pleading, ‘Uncle please spare us,’ but the mob did not relent and 9 children suffered injuries in the ensuing stone pelting.
The incident occurred on On Saturday, 2nd March, 2019, when around 50 kids of Soni International School were going to school by bus. Apparently, the brake of the bus failed and in a bid to save the lives of children, the bus driver turned the bus towards a field but in so doing hit a goat grazing there.
Angered by the incident, the goat owner (Hakeem) called more villagers and the mob started arguing with the bus driver and manhandled him. The driver, Mukesh Kushwaha, tried to explain to the villagers that he was forced to take the bus off road to prevent a major accident, but they were not ready to hear anything. Instead, a lady forced herself inside the bus, grabbed the driver’s neck and even bit him.
The driver and conductor hastily shut the bus door and rolled up the windows. The mob started pelting stones even as the terrified children, from nursery to Class-8, started screaming and pleading with them to stop.
The driver Mukesh and conductor got injured and they tried to save the kids by asking them to lie down in the bus. 9 children suffered injuries, as they were hit either by the stones or shards of glass. Soon police reached the spot and handled the situation. The injured were taken to the hospital.
On the statement given by the bus driver, police has identified a few people namely – Rizwan, Rafeeq, Shakeel, Rashid, Aarif, Shakir, Hakeem, Naeem, Naasir, Javed, Naushad, Mehmud, Alpesh – who pelted stones at the bus and have registered a case against them for rioting and other sections of IPC. On a complaint by Hakeem, a case has been registered against the driver Mukesh too.
Almost a week after the shocking incident, it has been buried by mainstream media, which has been busy with building a narrative of ‘Kashmiris under attack’ after the Pulwama terror attack. Outlets like NDTV have tried to downplay the incident by stressing repeatedly on ‘minor injuries’ suffered by the children.
A choreographed assault on a Kashmiri dry fruit seller in Lucknow by a saffron-kurta wearing history sheeter claiming to be from the conveniently named ‘Vishwa Hindu Dal’, is the latest focus of MSM to further their narrative of ‘Hindutva terror’ and target UP CM Yogi Adityanath. But none of the usual voices from media have questioned MP’s recently elected Congress government for this shocking incident from Indore.
During the protests agains the movie Padmaavat, a school bus in Gurgaon was targeted by vandals – that news had spread like wildfire as it dovetailed nicely with media’s agenda of highlighting ‘Hindu intolerance’.
Outlets like NDTV had multiple articles on just this one incident, but the Indore school bus attack has been dismissed with a mere 2 para report. While the perpetrators in the Gurgaon incident were clearly named and shamed (as they should), in the case of the Indore attack, most English news reports have not even named the attackers, leave alone descending on their village to question why so many of them carried out such a heinous crime?
Not surprisingly, nation’s public memory will retain the Gurgaon school bus attack, while the Indore school bus attack will stay confined to Indore locals and maybe some sections of social media.
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