India, Feb. 23 -- At 4am on March 4, 2020, inside a crowded relief camp at the Eidgah near Shiv Vihar, Shabya Bano went into labour. The 24-year-old was rushed to a maternity clinic half a kilometre away by her mother-in-law and a few volunteers, while her husband, then 31-year-old Mohammed Arshad, waited helplessly in a separate tent - men and women slept apart in the camp. Hours later, amid the chaos of riots raging just a kilometre away, their son, Arsh, was born.
Born in the rough and tumble of the riots, Arsh turns five next month.
"He's too young to understand the circumstances of his birth," said Arshad, now 35, over the phone from Dehradun. "I hope he never finds out."
Two years after the riots, the family left Delhi behind, movi...