30 Minutes Azamgarh to Aligarh: UP Muslims in crisis

Every time a bomb blast happens anywhere in India, the name of Azamgarh in Uttar Pradesh crops up. Every time a bomb goes off an Azamgarh boy is picked up to obtain more information.



The Batla House encounter in New Delhi has made the Muslims in Azamgarh extremely vulnerable. What happened in distant Delhi over a year ago still resonates in the eastern Uttar Pradesh district.



Sanjarpur is a small village in Azamgarh and any outsider driving into the village could be a police spy. Suspicious faces stare back at you and even journalists are unwelcome.



Two young men from the village, Atif and Sajid, were killed in Batla House in Delhi's Jamia Nagar when a team of Delhi Police officials stormed their flat.



Allegedly, the boys fired first. Inspector RC Sharma took a fatal bullet and his colleagues returned fire. Sajid's friend Saif, who was just 16 years old then, was arrested as an Indian Mujahideen suspect.