Ullaibettu on the boil - different versions

Ullaibettu on the boil - different versions

Mangalore Today News Network

Mangalore, Dec 7, 2014: A community of Ullaibettu, it is not communal lines that drive them to protest in front of their houses in fear. It is the police, who in their midnight ‘vigil’ on the village, are alleged to have forced themselves into 25 houses and seized the young men for  ’questioning’ as they say.

After violence on the main road, residents said a posse of policemen descended on the town, around 20 km from Mangaluru, and began their action. Most residents who spoke to media stated that  they were sleeping at the time when the police began banging on their doors. By the end of the op, many homes around Ullaibettu junction had   broken doors.

“We heard the noise. By the time we could get up and come at the door, around 20 policemen had knocked it down and began rounding up the young men,” said  residents.

A female senior citizen was alone in her tiled-roof house when policemen broke through her door and accused her of sheltering men, she said in tears. Further up the lane, doors of all 12 houses in an apartment were broken – even one flat which was vacant. In a house where eight women stay, the residents accused the “abusive” police of entering at 3 a.m., pushing them aside, and threatening to arrest them. Police are accused of ransacking belongings and cupboards.  By sunrise, over 30 people from the village were taken from their houses for questioning.

City Police Commissioner R. Hitendra said the police had the right to enter the houses during “searches”. When people do not cooperate with police by opening the door, we have the right to use force and enter…There is no need for a warrant in non-cognizable cases he said.

Accusations that the police did not wait for the doors to be opened  Commissioner Hitendra said r versions of events will differ, they just  did not cooperate.