Food is being cooked at a community kitchen at Babunagar. Local Muslims have raised funds for the community kitchen and food is being served to displaced families taken shelter at Muslim households. Picture by Prem Singh

Afsana, 37, Seema, 34, and Farhana, 36, and their eight children are huddled in a cramped room.

Gripped by fear, sorrow and depression, the three families of Shiv Vihar, one of the areas worst-hit by the riots in northeast Delhi, have been sheltered by a Muslim family in Mustafabad’s Babunagar.

“We have become pariahs overnight. The targeted violence broke out and continued for three days right under the nose of (Prime Minister Narendra) Modiji and (Arvind) Kejriwalji but the administration remained mute spectators. Our houses were burnt and we were made refugees overnight. We have lost everything and we do not know how we will survive from here on as there is no help in sight from the government,” Afsana wailed while clinging to her daughters Iram and Anam. Her husband Aslam is a rickshaw-van driver.

Afsana, Seema and Farhana are not alone.

With death staring at them after armed rioters had marched through Shiv Vihar and started setting homes and shops ablaze on February 24, the three women — and hundreds of Muslim and Hindu families — had fled their homes and reached the adjoining neighbourhoods of Mustafabad, Chandu Nagar, Chaman Park, all predominantly Muslim pockets.

Similarly, a large number of Hindu families whose homes have been torched have taken shelter in temples and in the houses of their relatives.

With little help visible from the Centre and the Delhi government so far, many Muslim households in the area have opened their homes to the displaced. They are running community kitchens by raising funds in the neighbourhood to feed the victims.

“The nightmare of insecurity still lives on. My two daughters were to appear for their board examinations which are underway but their admit cards and uniforms were burnt in the arson. They have been breaking down after missing their examinations,” Afsana mumbled.

Mohammad Hanif Mansoori, who has sheltered Afsana, Seema and Farhana, said: “With so much violence around, I decided to provide shelter and save them. I shifted my family to the other floors of the house. People in the area have come forward to help the victims as the government has failed to provide any relief. Almost every household in the area has sheltered these displaced families.”

Many of the displaced, especially women and children, require immediate medical care and clothes. Some NGOs and civil right groups have set up legal and medical camps in the area to attend to the victims.

“The scale of displacement is huge. Unless the government steps in, people are going to suffer a lot more. It requires a massive operation to provide relief to hundreds of people. Our volunteers of students, doctors and activists are not trained. It is getting very chaotic because the state is completely absent from the scene,” said a civil society volunteer working in the affected areas.

Civil rights groups said the government had abdicated its responsibility and failed in rehabilitating shattered lives.

The Delhi government has announced that it has converted 11 of its night shelters into relief camps. But civil society members are questioning the location of these camps and have raised concerns about their safety. Rights activist Harsh Mander has expressed “deep dismay” with the Delhi government for “refusing to set up large relief camps”.

He said such shelters are no substitute: they offer neither the safety nor dignity which people battered and terrorised by communal hate require from a caring state.

Seema, the mother of two sons aged 8 and 10, said the family ran to a mosque late on Monday night and managed to save their lives. She said the family had put off the light at the house to make the rioters believe that no one was inside.

“They torched the house adjacent to ours. We kept praying the entire night and fled to the nearby mosque in the wee hours on Tuesday. Later they burnt our house too. We somehow managed to flee on Tuesday afternoon to Babunagar and are sheltered by a Muslim family,” she recounted, her voice breaking.

“We are lucky to have survived but we do not know what our future will be. We have nothing left and are at the mercy of fellow Muslims who have sheltered us and have been providing food. But for how long?” she asked.

Her two sons suffered injuries on the forehead after they were hit by stones. They were treated at the medical camp set up by civil right groups on Saturday.

“Like many other displaced people, we are wearing the same set of clothes for the past five days,” said Seema.

Others said they had not bathed since Monday or Tuesday. “There is not enough water for so many people. We are somehow managing to supply them food,” said Mustafa, a student of Delhi University.

On the ground, this reporter could find no effort by the Delhi government to provide relief. “Volunteers, NGOs, students and members of civil right groups are desperately trying to reach out to every affected colony. Where is the government?” asked Rahman Usmani, a primary school teacher.

There are 7 BJP Lok Sabha MPs in Delhi, 3 MPs in the Rajya Sabha from AAP, 62 MLAs from the AAP in the capital besides eight MLAs from BJP but no one has visited the area so far.

“The local AAP MLA Haji Yunus has disappeared from the scene. We have no hopes from the BJP government at the Centre as its police colluded with the rioters allowed them to unleash violence. But what pains us to see betrayal by the local AAP government even though Muslims voted for the party as Kejriwal promised development and welfare of all,” Rahmani said.

Civil rights activists said the government needed to immediately set up medical camps with gynaecologists and child psychologists; provision for clean clothing; camps to assist people get necessary documents; facilitation desks for legal help in getting compensation; and immediate repair of all places of worship.