AHMADABAD, India (AP) - Chaos spread through this western Indian city Friday and the death toll over three days of Hindu-Muslim violence climbed to 246, despite patrols by hundreds of soldiers and orders for police to shoot rioters and arsonists on sight.
In the worst attack, 52 Muslims were killed as they slept in a shantytown after about 300 Hindus set their huts on fire, police said. After 27 bodies were pulled from the ashes, an additional 25 people died in the hospital; officials said 17 were being treated for serious burns.
The brutal Hindu reprisals are revenge for a Muslim attack on a train Wednesday, in which 58 people died, mostly Hindus.
The Gujarat state home secretary, K. Nityanandam, ordered police to shoot rioters and arsonists on sight Friday, and said 900 soldiers were patrolling the state capital, Ahmadabad, an industrial city of 3.5 million. But police said they could not control the spreading violence, as gangs blockaded roads, searched cars, set fire to shops and homes and fought each other.
Police opened fire at Muslims and Hindus who were tossing bombs at each other near a mosque in the suburb of Bapunagar, said Deputy Police Commissioner R.J. Savani. He said six were killed and 70 were hospitalized, but gave no further details.
"All through Thursday we were busy trying to protect the minority community (Muslims) from attacks from Hindus, but since this morning the retaliation has started," Savani said. "It has now turned to group clashes."
Nityanandam said 1,200 people had been arrested since Thursday, when furious Hindus first rampaged through Ahmadabad and 31 other towns, killing Muslims and burning their property during a strike protest the state government had supported. The strike had been called by Hindu nationalists affiliated with the governing party.
There were 14 children among the dead in the fiery attack on the train in the small town of Godhra; 42 others were injured, with 20 requiring hospitalization for burns or smoke inhalation.
Police said 63 people had been arrested on charges of murder and attempted murder for the train attack.
The Hindu groups said that action was not enough, and called for a nationwide strike on Friday. The nationwide strike did not fully materialize.
There was stone-throwing in Bombay, India's financial capital in a state bordering Gujarat. A train carrying thousands of passengers was derailed when Hindu activists placed concrete blocks across the tracks in a northeastern Bombay suburb, in an effort to enforce the strike. No injuries were reported.
There was little evidence of the strike elsewhere, including the national capital of New Delhi, although police were out in force.
Despite curfews in 36 towns in Gujarat state, there was no let up in arson, looting and assaults, prompting Muslim groups to call for direct federal rule in the state. People continued to stream into hospitals, mostly for treatment of stab wounds, but also just for safety.
Gunfire and war cries were heard in the darkness Thursday night, and bodies lay where they fell. Survivors ventured out to collect their dead and seek treatment for their wounds after dawn.
Most of the Muslims in the shantytown of Narora, on the outskirts of Ahmadabad, had fled on Thursday, fearing they would be targets of the Hindus roaming the city as police watched, unwilling or unable to stop them.
But shanty dwellers who remained sleeping in their huts were killed in the fire, which was sparked at about 2 a.m. by some 300 Hindus, said Deputy Police Commissioner P.B. Gondya. Seven women and eight children were among the first 27 bodies recovered.
All through Thursday, Hindus wielding iron rods and cans of kerosene roamed the blockaded streets of Gujarat state, attacking Muslims. In Thursday's worst violence, 2,000 Hindus set fire to six homes in an affluent Muslim neighborhood in Ahmadabad. At least 38 people burned to death, including 12 children. Hundreds of Muslim homes, stores, hotels, and restaurants were torched or looted by the attackers.
"Police can't protect each lane and bylane," said Police Commissioner P.C. Pandey, responding to criticism that thousands of police watched silently as Hindus targeted Muslims.
Tensions have been growing between Muslims and Hindu nationalists who have been traveling across Gujarat by train to go back and forth to Ayodhya, in northern India, where the World Hindu Council plans to start building a temple next month on the ruins of a 16th-century mosque.
The 1992 destruction of the mosque by Hindus sparked nationwide riots that killed 2,000 people. The government has called for calm, fearing bloodshed could spread quickly in this nation of more than 1 billion, where Hindu-Muslim fighting killed nearly a million people after independence in 1947.
This week's violence is believed to be the worst Hindu-Muslim fighting since 1993 riots in Bombay - also related to the destruction of the mosque in Ayodhya - killed at least 800 people.
Rajendra Singh, the police superintendent in northern Uttar Pradesh, said 10,000 paramilitary troops had surrounded Ayodhya to prevent violence. Some 20,000 Hindu activists have gathered to pray for the temple construction.