A group of young Africans found themselves in the middle of a political and media furore in Delhi with a greenhorn minister in the new state government accusing them of being part of a "prostitution and drug racket" and demanding their arrest. Four Ugandan women later filed a police case over the midnight raid.
The women, mostly Ugandans and Nigerians, said they were assaulted by "people not in uniform" while a member of the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) charged the minister with making "racist remarks" against Africans.
The vigilantism of Bharti and the AAP cadre in rounding up some African nationals for medical tests on suspicion of being involved in "drug and sex racket" has attracted widespread condemnation from both the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), who termed it "reprehensible".
The four Ugandan nationals registered a police case against "unknown people" for misbehaving with them during the early Thursday raid by Delhi Law Minister Somnath Bharti and his party cadre, said police officials.
The four women, including one who was beaten up, have also sent their complaints to the Ugandan High Commission here, a senior police official told IANS.
"They have filed a complaint against unknown people who misbehaved with them," the official added.
In the complaint, they said that "some unidentified people knocked at their door" past midnight and "when she asked them, they asked her to come out.
"When I refused, they continued banging on the door. I then opened the door and was caught and attacked."
She went on to say the police came at the right time and she was taken to a hospital for medical test and later discharged.
Speaking to IANS Friday, one of the women, who called herself Sandra, a student, narrated the incident: "We were in our house when suddenly we heard people shouting outside.
"When we peeped out, we saw a huge crowd. We got scared and locked ourselves inside," Sandra, 24, who said she was pursuing a course from the Indira Gandhi National Open University, added.
Her friend Selvia, 23, who has come for medical treatment, said: "They hurled abuses and insulted us."
Both of them said the police came and told them to come out of their rooms. "We were taken to the hospital and were later allowed to go home," Sandra said.
"We thought the crowd will kill us. We were very scared," she added.
She was talking about the past midnight raid by Delhi Law Minister Somnath Bharti and AAP cadres who reached Khirki Extension in south Delhi to bust a "prostitution and drug racket" about which the minister received complaints.
According to eyewitnesses, the minister and the party volunteers came in large numbers and tried to barge into a house from which they claimed a "drug and sex ring" was operating.
Other Africans, most of whom come here either for higher studies or for medical treatment, said men wearing "black jackets" knocked on their door.
"Around 12.30 a.m., I was inside my house with my roommates, when some people wearing black jackets started knocking on our main door. They wanted us to show them our passports," 29-year-old Irene, who lives in the same lane, told IANS.
"However, after five to 10 minutes, the police came and took them away," she said, adding she felt the mob would "kill" them.
When the police reached the spot, the minister had a heated argument asking them to arrest those operating the "racket". But Delhi Police, in defiance of the minister, refused on the ground that under the law women could not be arrested after sunset and that they did not have a warrant.
Bharti's vigilante action came in for much criticism with a new entrant to the party, activist Mallika Sarabhai, saying the minister's remarks against Africans "smacked of racism".
The minister had said he decided to take action because of "complaints from women in the neighbourhood" about the activities of some "foreign nationals", which included "Nigerians or Ugandans".
"Just because a few Nigerians have been caught in a drug scandal does not mean that all of us are peddlers. People should stop generalising," said Divine from Nigeria who works at an African style hair salon, run by a countryman, in Arjun Nagar here.
"If any black person does something bad, here they blame it on Nigerians. But there are so many Africans from countries like Ghana, Congo, Cameroon, Togo," said Nigerian national Jacob, who spends part of the year here buying medical equipment for Nigeria.
Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Manish Tewari posted a tweet saying the action of the AAP cadres in forcing some African women to undergo medical tests is a "blot" and "reprehensible and obtuse".
BJP's Arun Jaitley also tweeted that "Delhi Police ACP has stood by law and not meekly followed diktats of his minister - the only redeeming feature in this unseemly episode."
"The action by the AAP cadres to carry out medical tests which included cavity search on some women foreign nationals is contrary to law," wrote the BJP leader.
However, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal Thursday denied his ministers were interfering in police work, saying it was the duty of the ministers to speak and act if they witnessed any crime.
He also demanded the Delhi Police suspend the police officers involved.
Manish Sisodia, a Delhi minister and a close confidante of Kejriwal, said: "If by Monday, police officers are not suspended, we will sit on dharna."
But the police refused to do so, saying they were only following the law. Both the Delhi Police, which functions under the union home ministry, and some ministers of the Delhi government reached the doors of Lt. Governor Najeeb Jung, who Friday ordered an inquiry into the incident.
