By Rupam Jain Nair
AHMEDABAD, India (Reuters) - Muslim survivors of one ofIndia's worst religious riots are planning to convert the burntbuildings where their relatives were killed into a museum.
More than 2,500 people, most of them Muslims, were burnedand hacked to death in a month of violence in Gujarat inwestern India six years ago, according to human rights groups.Officials put the death toll at about 1,000.
Twenty-six deserted and charred houses standing in theGulbarg Society, a Muslim-dominated housing project inAhmedabad, Gujarat's main city, are a reminder of one of theriot's more infamous episodes.
On February 28, 2002, a mob of Hindu men killed at least 39residents, according to official numbers. Another 20 residentshave been missing ever since, including five children.
Some were locked inside their homes which were then set onfire. Others were stabbed with swords or pelted with stones,according to survivors' accounts of the day.
Blood-stained clothes, swords and victims' belongings willnow be displayed in the buildings as a reminder of the day.
"Pain, tears and wounds cannot be exhibited but burnthomes, blood spots, swords, stones will narrate the story,"said Javed Muhammed Sheikh, who lost his wife and two childrenin riots.
Javed says he watched as his wife was dragged out of thehouse and stabbed repeatedly. His sons, then aged seven and 10,were set on fire and left to die.
He, like other survivors, now lives permanently in a reliefcamp set up after the riots. The killers have never beencaught.
"All I can do for my family is to share their story withthe world in the museum by displaying toys and books of mychildren who loved life," he said.
A voluntary organisation called Citizens for Justice andPeace is helping the victims to design the museum, which willinclude exhibits about other religious riots since India'sindependence.
"There's no place for us to pay our respects to riotvictims. We want people to come face-to-face with violence,"said the organisation's Teesta Setalvad.
Wednesday marked the sixth anniversary of the deadly trainfire in the town of Godhra which helped trigger the riots inthe Hindu-dominated state.
Fifty-nine passengers, most of them Hindu pilgrims, died inthe fire, which broke out shortly after a scuffle with Muslimtea and food vendors at the train station. Dozens of Muslim menhave been jailed, accused of plotting to murder the Hindupassengers.
A central government committee ruled that the fire was anaccident.
(Editing by Jonathan Allen and Sugita Katyal)
