MALAKPUR, Uttar Pradesh— Of the 42,000 people who fled their homes in Muzaffarnagar after violence broke out between Hindus and Muslims in early September, several thousand have settled near this village, about 60 miles north of New Delhi, staying in rows of colorful tarpaulin tents that are just wide enough for a cot and just high enough to allow one to sit upright.
Bullock carts, motorbikes and tractors compete with each other on the narrow road leading up to the makeshift camp, set up on about 120 acres of state government land in Shamli district where a thick growth of kikar trees was razed. Near the entrance of the camp, under a rectangular canopy a large group of men sat on their knees to offer prayers, or namaz.
These men had lived in harmony with their Jat neighbors, a dominant land-owning Hindu caste, in Muzaffarnagar area until the clashes between the Jats and Muslims began on Sept. 7. Now, many of these refugees are refusing to return to their villages.
“We will not go back,” said Mohammad Shatir Shah, 23, who escaped his village of Bahawari with his family of 15 on Sept. 8 at about 10:30 p.m. after violence escalated.
“What is left for us in our village? Just cinders,” said Mr. Shah, a father of four children, whose house was burned by a group of armed men. He witnessed the arson from sugarcane fields near his house, where he hid along with his family members soon after they fled their home.
After Mr. Shah and his family spent three hours in the fields and made repeated phone calls to the local administration for help, an Indian Army vehicle ferried them to a camp in the nearby Jaula village in Muzaffarnagar district. A brief stop later, the family took a northern course on foot to the Malakpur camp, where one of their relatives had sought refuge.
Mr. Shah and his family traversed an estimated nine miles in almost 11 hours to reach their destination, snaking through the unfamiliar, dense fields, avoiding the streets and roads, where violence continued.
Bahawari and the villages of Kutba, Kutbi, Lank and Lisarh were among the villages worst affected by the violence in Muzaffarnagar, the trigger for which were three killings in Kawal village of Muzaffarnagar district on Aug. 27. Two of the slain were Jat men and one was a Muslim man.
Multiple narratives have emerged about the exact incident that led to a dispute between the men, but what is clear is that the triple murder fueled tensions in the area. Three legislators, including two from the Bharatiya Janata Party and one from Bahujan Samaj Party, were arrested on charges of making speeches that allegedly incited violence.
On the morning of Sept. 7, thousands of Jat farmers returned from a council meeting held near Kawal village, which was attended by local politicians and community leaders, and deadly attacks between the two communities followed. Government officials say 49 were killed in the clashes, which the police and the Indian Army were able to control after a few days.
A month after the riots broke out, about 24,000 people continue to live in refugee camps in the districts of Shamli and Muzaffarnagar, according to the state administration officials. The officials, who want the displaced to return to their native villages, say the number of refugees has been on a decline.
“We are providing them security in their villages and organizing meetings between members of the two communities,” said Kaushal Raj Sharma, district magistrate of Muzaffarnagar, on Friday.
P.K. Singh, the district magistrate of Shamli who is responsible for the relief operations in the Malakpur camp, said the number of refugees in the camp is no more than 3,000. But Abdul Qayyoom, one of the camp’s 11 organizers, said on Friday that the population was more like 10,000, with an increase of about 3,500 people in less than two weeks.
Like most of those displaced by the riots, the family of Mr. Shah had left home empty handed. His little children even lost their slippers during the long walk, and his own foot bled from an injury, which is still healing.
“Where will I take my children?” he said as he sat on the edge of a string cot, which he shared with his mother, two of his children and his wife, who used a handmade straw fan to keep their infant son cool under a pink tarp tent. At night, some of the family members coop up inside the tent and the others sleep on cloth sheets, outside in the open.
As some children squatted on the ground at the periphery of Mr. Shah’s tent, they said, almost all at once, “It is so hot here.” Among them was 13-year-old Saiba Khatoon, one of Mr. Shah’s six siblings.
“I miss my friends,” said Saiba, who studied at a madrassa, an Islamic school, in her village. When asked what she missed the most about her home, she said, “I miss the Koran.”
Two of Mr. Shah’s brothers also had been enrolled in school; one studied in grade four and the other one in grade eight. Both were good students, and the family had high hopes for their future. But now their parents are unsure if the children will be able to go to school again.
“We just want a place to live,” said Mr. Shah, who sold clothes in and around his village and earned up to 1,000 rupees, or $16, a day. His family owned 1,800 square feet of land in Bahawari village, on which they had built five separate houses, but everything has been burned.
He estimated the family loss at almost 2 million rupees, which included property, gold and silver jewelry and 150,000 rupees in cash. They have lodged a complaint with the local police station in the town of Kairana, 30 miles west of Muzaffarnagar.
The camp, with its scant provisions for sanitation, is not a long-term option. Some refugees go to the nearby village, which is about a third of a mile, to bathe, mostly under tube well water. Only recently installed hand pumps allow refugees access to water; before that, they had to rely on water tankers. With only 12 toilets for the entire settlement — six for men and six for women — most refugees use the surrounding fields.
Muslim residents from four villages that are within a two-mile radius of the camp are helping the refugees with basic means of subsistence. They have formed a committee, which is overseeing the aid that is pouring in for the refugees, mostly through a network of community members from within Uttar Pradesh as well as neighboring states. Some supplies from the state administration are delivered to the camp, but the organizers say they are insufficient.
“The government has only sent supplies seven times since Sept. 13,” said Mr. Qayyoom. The ration included rice, wheat, sugar, potatoes, onions, tea leaves, and milk. He said that the daily ration requirement at the camp was nearly 2,500 kilograms (5,500 pounds) but that the government has only supplied 8,500 kilograms in the last three weeks.
However, Mr. Singh, the Shamli district magistrate, insisted that the district administration supplies medicines and raw material to the camp every two to three days, based on the residents’ needs.
The refugees receive three meals a day in the camp: a breakfast of tea and biscuits usually, and lunches and dinners are mostly a preparation of vegetables, lentils, rice and roti.
Mr. Shah said that his family had yet to receive help from the government. “The cots, tents and food were given to us by the local villagers,” he said. The clothes they wore had been donated by community members. Some villagers have even provided utensils.
Back in Muzaffarnagar district, a sum of 21.5 million rupees has been allocated as compensation for the affected families. A total of 656 items have been registered in the government log as damaged property, including houses, shops and farm tractors.
Mr. Sharma, the district magistrate, said state government officials had surveyed the burned houses and in almost 70 percent cases the victims were present for the evaluation of their damaged property. The remaining could not be located at refugee camps, he said.
“Fifty percent of the compensation amount will be given in the form of drafts starting Monday,” Mr. Sharma said on Friday. The next installment will be disbursed once reconstruction work begins.
The families of those who were killed are being given 1 million rupees each, and one member from each of these families has been offered a job in a state government office, based on an individual’s qualifications. The authorities said that appointment letters had already been given to the new recruits.
But the Muzaffarnagar officials’ reassurances of compensation and safety are not enough to entice Mr. Shah to take his family and return home. “I want to find some work and settle with my family in a nearby village,” he said.