Residents of Hampi village are hapless and homeless two days after the district administration bulldozed their homes and shops in a drive to 'sanctify' the heritage ruins.
"We had warded off this operation for 10 years. But over the last three years, the district administration had been pressuring us to move from here. It was alleged that Hampi's sanctity was being ravaged by people living near the heritage site. But these people have been staying here even before Hampi was declared a heritage site," said Ravi Kulkarni, an angry resident.
He rubbished reports that local people were resorting to sale of narcotics, cooking non vegetarian food and clandestinely serving liquor to tourists and foreigners.
"They were only selling fresh flowers, coconuts, agarbattis (scented sticks) and camphor which are part of the offerings to Lord Virupaksha who is the presiding deity of the town. They sell sharbat and tender coconuts too to tourists," said Surendra, a supporter of the people who lost their homes and shops. "They did not even give 24 hours notice to us" said Siddeshwar Sangu who lost his shop in the operation.
"They came at 11 pm on Friday and told us to vacate. At 5 am on Saturday, they came equipped with earth moving machinery and began demolitions. My family was sleeping in the small room behind the shop and they were rudely thrown out in the melee," he added.
"Our district has powerful ministers. But none of them came to our help. Just one MLA Anand Singh arrived to support us. But he was soon arrested and taken away," said Kulkarni.
Helen Quincy, who had come from the British Columbia to study the ruins, was aghast to see people's dwellings and shops being demolished under the government authority.
"Instead, they should have erected hawking zones for them. Surely, the tourists cannot go hungry and thirsty and without buying a souvenir," she said.
An official in the district administration defended their action. "We had our orders to demolish structures protruding from shops and houses that were in the vicinity of the heritage ruins."
The homeless of Hampi claimed that the district administration did not give them even a 24-hour notice
