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This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from November 1984.
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"The mob came here Thursday and looted everything," he said, pointing to the bare shelves and empty display cases. "I was lucky that I was not here. I was at home, afraid to come out."
Along the street, filled with cars, three-wheel scooter cabs and donkey carts, Hindu merchants were open for business, their shops untouched by the rioters. A few of them wandered over to the Sikh establishments, shook their heads in disgust and offered words of comfort to the Sikhs. Many of the 13 million strong Sikh minority have accused the largely Hindu police of allowing the rioters to attack Sikh establishments in wake of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's assassination last Wednesday by two Sikh bodyguards. Some Sikhs have claimed to reporters that some police officers even joined in the orgy of vengeance, which left more than 1,000 dead nationwide. At least 16,000 people, mostly Sikhs, took refuge in shrines, police stations and camps in the New Delhi area alone.
As the merchants helped one storekeeper clean up what remained of his shop, a tall, gray-haired police officer strolled up, shook hands with a Sikh friend and whispered a few words to him. The elderly Sikh shook his head sadly and shrugged his shoulders in response.
"He is our friend," one Sikh said of the policeman. "A few months ago, he helped us when crowds came. But this time, there were so many of them, there was nothing police could do."
At the Karol Bagh Police Station, Sikhs were sifting through piles of tools, cleaning supplies, cloth bolts, sewing machines and even color television sets which had been hauled off by looters but later recovered by police.
New Delhi newspapers quote police as saying they have recovered about 2.5 million rupees (217,000 U.S. dollars) worth of looted goods within the past two days.
Merchants who can identify their property can get it back after obtaining a court order. But many of the goods, piled up in the garden of the police station or along the street, had been damaged by looters.
