The riot began—as riots often do in India—on the night of 2 May in seemingly innocuous fashion: Hindu groups in the desert city of Jodhpur noticed Islamic flags tied to a traffic roundabout that was home to a bust of a Hindu Brahmin freedom fighter called Balmukund Bissa.



Hindus also noticed that a saffron Hindu flag on the roundabout, fastened there to celebrate the Hindu festival of Parshuram Jayanti falling on 1 May was missing. Hindus accused Muslims of removing their flag, which Muslims denied. Words were exchanged, said the police and locals, and, soon, Muslims and Hindus were attacking each other with stones, sticks and firebombs.



On Eid-ul-Fitr, 3 May, Muslims found a saffron flag—Hindu groups had removed the Islamic flags—on the roundabout and when police, fearing further tension, tried to stop them from removing it, they attacked the police. Vexed officers, struggling to keep the peace, removed the saffron flag and hoisted the tricolour instead.



By the end of the day, the police imposed a curfew. The riots were fierce: 211 people were arrested and of the nine policemen injured, three were “critical”, director general of police M L Lather told Article 14. Mobile Internet services were suspended for five days and the epicentre of the clashes, the usually crowded Jalori gate at the heart of the city, swarmed with security forces.

On 3 May, chief minister Ashok Gehlot of the Congress party put out a series of tweets, expressing concerns over the riots. By afternoon, the situation had worsened, and Gehlot had to cancel his visit to Jodhpur, his hometown, 350 km southwest of here, where he intended to celebrate his 71st birthday that day.

Meanwhile, less than 12 hours after the first riot, India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is the opposition party in Rajasthan, waded into the flag affair. Social-media accounts linked to the BJP made fake claims. “Islamic goons replace Indian national flag with Islamic flag at #Jodhpur,” said one.

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