A National Human Rights Commission’s initiative to heal the rift between Hindu and Muslim communities in Basbariya settlement of Bidhyanagar VDC-2, Kapilvastu, has offered hope to its inhabitants, who were living in fear for the last few months. 

The two communities had fallen out over a disagreement during a Durga Pooja procession in October last year, which has led to two incidents of clashes, an alleged lynching of a Hindu man by a mob of Muslim men on December 12, and mass desertion of Muslim families from the settlement.

To restore the harmony, the NHRC recently organised a public function for reconciliation in the settlement, where Hindu leader Darbari Yadav and Muslim leader Moid Khan appealed to the Basbariya residents to put their differences behind and encouraged to live in harmony and to respect one another.

NHRC member Mohna Ansari said the incidents of violence will be investigated and the guilty will be booked. 

Police have already arrested eight suspects while arrest warrants have been issued against 16 others at large. 

The effort of the NHRC and the community leaders to restore social harmony in Basbariya has offered a much-needed encouragement to the people to re-establish communication with one another, said Rahisan Badhai, a local man. 

The Hindu-Muslim tension in the settlement is certainly easing these days, he said, recalling how the two communities avoided each other until recently.

He added that the families that had fled in the wake of the violence were also returning home. 

A complete normalcy has yet to return in Basbariya, but a glimmer of progress has definitely been lit.