The Bombay City Police: A Historical Sketch, 1672-1916Edwardes, S. M. (Stephen Meredyth)
History
The Bombay City Police: A Historical Sketch, 1672-1916
Edwardes, S. M. (Stephen Meredyth)
Crime -- India -- Mumbai; Police -- India -- Mumbai
On arrival there I found the road littered with new road-metal which was
being flung at the police and the tram-cars and the military pickets
by two large mobs situated, the one in Bhendy Bazaar and the other in
Memonwada which debouches on Paidhuni. It was reported to me that about
4 p.m. the mob began to be very troublesome and the Paidhuni police went
out with some mounted police to move them, but were forced to retire.
At 4-15 the police again made a sally on the mob, but were stoned back
again to Paidhuni. At about 4-30 p.m. the tram-traffic between the J. J.
Hospital and Paidhuni came to a standstill. A European in a motor-car was
stoned. The police then rushed out again and the mob retreated a little
distance up Banian Row and Paidhuni Road and stoned them from there.
Meanwhile a gang of Mahomedans at the junction of Chuna Batti was stoning
carriages and trams. A tram-car in which a lady was seated was stopped
by another gang and stones were thrown at the lady, who was hit on the
left cheek. Then a number of Musalman youths got hold of the lady’s
skirts, and as far as Sub-Inspector Butterfield (who was coming up to her
rescue) could see, tried to pull the lady out of the car. Sub-Inspector
Butterfield and 3 privates of the Warwicks with 6 constables then
appeared on the spot. They were met by a shower of road-metal, but forced
the mob some 20 or 25 paces up Chuna Batti, whence they were continuously
stoned. Each time that they retired the crowd pressed forward again. At
about 5 p.m. their retreat was cut off by another mob, which commenced
throwing stones from the opposite side in Banian Cross Road and Pinjrapur
Road. At 5-10 Sub-Inspector Butterfield saw the military officer at
Paidhuni signal to him and the soldiers to get away from the danger zone,
and as their retreat was cut off and they were unable to fight their
way through, they ensconced themselves behind a municipal urinal at the
junction of Chuna Batti and held the crowd off until firing commenced.
While in this position they were continuously stoned both from the street
and from the houses. Among those injured by the stoning of the trams was
a Hindu solicitor, whose companion reports that there was a group of
Pathans with stones at Nawab’s Masjid, and that the car in which he and
his friend were sitting was stoned by bodies of rioters on both sides of
Bhendy Bazaar from Nawab’s Masjid to Paidhuni. Mr. Paton of Messrs. W.
and A. Graham and Company, who had come down with his wife to see the
tabut procession and occupied an upper room in a house at the corner of
Memonwada and Bhendy Bazaar, reports that he had to close the windows of
the room in the side and rear against stones that were flung from the
street. In referring to a group of Pathans who halted under the verandah
of the house he writes:—
“In my twenty years’ experience of this country I never before
witnessed behaviour which so impressed me with a sense of
sinister intentions.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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