Once a bustling place, Bhadrak now a ghost town

It was 1.30 pm. After driving for around two and half hours from Bhubaneswar, I finally reached the trouble-torn town of

Bhadrak

.

I entered the city from the side of

Bhadrak stadium

. Near the

Kutchery Chowk

, two policemen were sitting under a flyover. The roads wore a
deserted look since curfew had been imposed. One of the policemen asked for my credentials and allowed me to proceed.

I asked them about the worst affected area in Friday’s violence. They said it was Chandan Bazaar. Wasting no time, I left for the place. I
came across two women, one in a sari and another in a salwar, a middle-aged man and three children. I asked them where they were
going. “We are leaving the town and going to a relative’s place. The situation here is not good. Most of the people in our locality have
already left last night and earlier in the day,” one of women said.

When quizzed further, they refused to reveal their names even. They left and I resumed my journey towards Chandan Bazaar. It has mostly
two-storied concrete houses. The ground floor serves as the wholesale market and godowns while the traders reside on the first floor.

An eerie silence greeted me. Smoke was still billowing from one of the shops and some people had gathered in front of the shop. Some people were peeping throw the windows or staring from the rooftops. Flames were visible in at least two shops and a group of men were trying to douse it.

“The anti-socials burnt the shops in the presence of the police. They did nothing. But when we tried to douse the flame, they prevented us
citing that curfew has been imposed,” alleged Ashok Gupta, one of the traders.

“It was around 6.30 when a group of hooligans raided the market,”another trader narrated. “They pelted stones at us and torched the shops one after the other. Everything was reduced to ashes within minutes,” he added.

As I moved from one street to another, I could see people blocking the entry and exits with logs and had set up bamboo barricades to obstruct possible entry of anti-socials. In the afternoon, police conducted a flag march.

In the Bhadrak district headquarters hospital, patients and their attendants were in a fix. “My daughter has been referred to SCB Medical College and Hospital, Cuttack. But there is no vehicle. Even the ambulance is not ready to move,” lamented Savitri Nayak, a woman whose son had been admitted in the hospital after suffering injuries in an accident.

By 5 in the afternoon I had exhausted the biscuits and water I had been carrying. There was nothing to eat. Thinking that shops may be
open close to the railway station, I reached there. All I could see were shops with their shutters down. I saw people, including students
and children, raising their hands on their to and from the railway station.

On my way back, at

Kantabania Square

, I saw posters put up in front of a house talking about peace. It kept playing on my mind long after I
had left the place.

(Sanjib Das is principal photographer, The Times of India)

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