Bhopal, January 16
Twenty persons have been rounded up for arson and loot at Ganj Basoda where the curfew imposed on Tuesday continued today with a two-hour relaxation in the morning. The situation today was claimed to be under control.

Prohibitory orders have been promulgated in the neighbouring towns of Lateri and Sironj while a general alert has been sounded across the state.

The trouble started yesterday when some people saw a cow being slaughtered in the house of a member of the minority community. The person, however, escaped the irate mob with his wife and daughter in a rickshaw but all three of them were later taken into custody by the police.

The mob, apparently led by Bajrang Dal and VHP activists — Ganj Basoda in Vidisha district is a sensitive town — looted the shops and set fire to them. Around 50 shops were damaged.

The police controlled the mob first by bursting tear gas shells and then firing in the air. Top police and civil officials from Bhopal had reached Ganj Basoda in the afternoon. The reinforcements were rushed from Bhopal and Sagar.

Reports received here said complaints about the same person killing cows had been made to the police earlier also but the police did not act. Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Babulal Gaur said it was much too serious an offence that the person killed a cow on the auspicious Sankranti day.