jersusalem, and warned against carrying out a threatened eviction of palestinian families that has sent tensions soaring. it comes as at least 50 palestinians have been injured in clashes with israeli police at the al—aqsa mosque compound in jerusalem. protesters have gathered outside a police headquarters in rio dejaneiro in brazil following a security operation in which 25 people were killed — including one police officer. they accuse the force of carrying out a massacre against the poor of the favelas. debris from a chinese rocket is expected to fall back to earth in an uncontrolled re—entry this weekend. it was used to launch the first module of china's new space station last month. china says the risk of damage is �*extremely low�*.

now on bbc news witness history. divya arya dozens of people had to be rescued from a tower hello and welcome to a special edition of witness history with me, divya arya, here in delhi as we present remarkable eyewitness accounts of key moments in india's modern history. coming up, we'll hear how india built a modern city in the 19505... ..the story of goa's struggle for independence... ..plus, we remember the industrial disaster at bhopal in 1984... ..and the pioneers of india's international call centres. but we begin with partition, when in 1947, british—controlled india won its independence and split into two states, india and pakistan. india had a hindu majority, pakistan was predominantly muslim.

millions of people were forced to leave their homes and switch countries amid terrible communal violence. and its legacy is still felt today, not least by those whose families chose to remain despite the political and religious divide. this is the story of one of them. i'm mohammad amir mohammad khan, known as suleiman to family and friends, the raja of mehmoodabad. i'm from a muslim family which once ruled a very large feudal estate, including a beautiful palace called the qila of mehmoodabad. the indian government is laying claim to my property, saying that it is enemy property. no one is paying for it.

so these days, everything is crumbling. this dispute goes back to 1947, the partition of india into two states, a muslim majority state called pakistan and a hindu majority state of india. it was estimated that a million people died, ten million people were displaced. some muslims went to the state of pakistan. many hindus came to india. it was not just the country that was divided, families were divided too. in the late 50s, my father took pakistani nationality, and that is when my family's problems began.

because when india and pakistan went to war in 1965, the government laid claim to our properties. there was an act of parliament called the enemy property act, which empowered the government to take over, temporarily, the properties of pakistanis. it was notjust our family which was affected, thousands of families were affected, the properties are worth billions of dollars. but our issue is that only my father took pakistan in nationality, i have always been an indian. my mother was always an indian. we had to fight our case from the lowest to the highest

court, and in every court, we won. and the supreme courtjudge said that by no stretch of imagination could i be considered an enemy, and considered me the heir to my father's properties. but then the government went and changed the laws, and the battle has begun again. i suppose like so many people in india and pakistan, we're still caught up in the repercussions of partition and the acrimonious relations between india and pakistan. in a way, i've been forced

to live in the past. and with apologies to yeats, ifeel as if i'm drowning in a beauty that has long since faded from this earth. the raja of mehmoodabad. after the trauma of partition, there was a determination to build a new, modern india. one of the more memorable projects was launched by the indian prime minister, jawaharlal nehru, when in 1950, he invited the famous architect le corbusier to build a brand new capital for the punjab province in chandigarh. le corbusier got his first opportunity to design a whole new city in india, where nehru commissioned him to lay out the capital city of the punjab, chandigarh. they wanted the citizens of the state of punjab and in india as a whole to regain their confidence, which could have been shattered due to this dramatic partition

of the country into india and pakistan. and to bring back the faith in the future, they wanted revolutionary ideas. buildings have to become - sanctuaries from the climate. the sun breakers break- the summer sun when it is high in the sky, and admit - the winter sun when it is low. corbusier was very concerned about the harsh climate of this particular city and the region, and he wanted to provide comfortable conditions, living conditions, for all the residents. the city is cut up into 30 residential sectors- by the road system. each residential sectorl has its own shops, post office, school, health- centre, playground, gardens. the road system is designed in such a way that no door. of any house or building opens onto a thoroughfare _ of fast traffic.

my grandparents were migrants from pakistan and i do remember them very clearly telling us that we were lucky to have taken this house in chandigarh where we had, because of this huge plot which we had, which had abundance of green both on the front and the rear. we used to cycle. i remember feeling like a lord because the roads were so wide and we used to have just one going up and down. the indians are also - proud of the city centre, the business area with its banks and administrativel buildings, which to _ a westerner, look monotonous, grey and empty. the indians regard it. as dignified and clean, a mark of maturity. corbusier was given a mandate that you have this limited budget and the city cannot afford beyond that. because of his creative genius, he was able to use local material, locally available materials. they were very good

bricks, the soil was very good, you know. what is architecturally one of the most modern cities| in the world is being built- by men and women who have to cart each brick, each - measure of earth and concrete, as they were carted 4,000 years ago. i the open hand monument signifies the very concept of the city. the open palm signifies open to give, open to receive. a lot of people from pakistan had to migrate to india and they had to be suitably housed. and it stands majestically, beautifully positioned against the backdrop of shivalik hills. as so often, le corbusier has put his work on a grandiose scale using the mountains

as a backdrop. today we are fighting tooth and nail to preserve the backdrop of the shivalik hills. it is marred by urbanisation, and the intent of keeping it green, as corbusier envisioned, is lost. i think the city would lose quite a bit. so it is our duty as citizens that we must save chandigarh. the architect sumit kaur on the creation of chandigarh. now, even after indian independence in 1947, there were some parts of india that remained under european colonial control. goa on the west coast of india was ruled by the portuguese till 1961, when finally, the indian army marched across the border to reclaim the lost territory, ending centuries of european rule in india. libia lobo sardesai took part in goa's struggle for independence. in 1947, when india became independent from british rule, i was a young goan

student in bombay. but goa had not become independent at the same time because goa was a portuguese colony. 10,000 demonstrators in new delhi crowd around india's parliament house, shouting demands that portugal abandon goa, the tiny colony on india's coast she has held since the 16th century. people in goa could not get any newspapers from india, and the people were suffocating more because of lack of news and lack of communication. we found two wireless sets. we built them up into transmitters that we can use these transmitters to communicate with the people through the radio. the name of the radio translated in english, it is voice of freedom. but the real name was was voz da liberdade, which the portuguese could understand. the broadcast used to be in portuguese and konkani twice a day for one hour.

the transmitter was first, as a trial method, put in a truck, and the truck was stationed in a forest so that nobody could discern it. it used to rain very heavily. you could not put your foot without being bitten by a leech. now, it is just difficult to imagine because it was notjust a day or two, but six years. two of us were doing the broadcast, mr vaman sardesai and myself. and we had done such a historic work together that we could not part. so we decided to marry. feelings have reached a boiling point over this last european possession.

and december 15th, 1961, the indian army started marching towards goa. so we were getting all the news from the army as to how they had progressed, what had happened, and we were also communicating this to the people of goa. the indian army came fully prepared, but there was no, what you may say, resistance anywhere. 0n the contrary, people used to crowd in front of them to welcome them. without even any shots being fired, without any persons being killed, huh? the armyjust walked through. it was a cakewalk. the portuguese abandoned theirarms, knowing they could not make any show against the 30,000 invading troops. the chief of staff very jubilantly told me, do you know, lobo, the portuguese have surrendered now, goa is free.

oh, i just jumped with joy. and i said, i would like to go up in the skies now so that everybody hears me announce that goa is free. the chief of staff said, i think we will send you there and we'll put in autoplane with loudspeakers on its belly. for two hours, we roamed over the whole of goa to inform all the people. we told them to rejoice because goa has now been reunited with the motherland after 450 years. freedom is a thing that can intoxicate you. i was completely intoxicated. libya lobo sardesai on the struggle for goa. remember, you can watch witness history every wednesday on bbc world news,

or you can catch up on all our films, along with more than a thousand radio programmes in our online archive. just search for bbc witness history. coming up after the break, the environmental disaster our next story is one that few could forget. as india has grown and modernised, it has also faced the challenges of industrial and environmental pollution. in 1984, an industrial disaster in the city of bhopal shocked the country and the world. farah edwards khan was there that day. we could see the union carbide factory from the topmost part of our house. it was making pesticides and it was a source of income for poor people. it was a normal evening, we we went to bed and then about11:30, 11:45, we heard a big banging on the door. my father, he opened the door and my cousin was standing outside there and he said there's been a gas accident.

we didn't realise what exactly was happening. we shut the doors and we went off to sleep. the next morning, my family woke up and my father drove me down to the school, everything was very quiet. there was a silence. we saw some people just lying, and my fathersaid, "0h, wedding season, must be drunk." we drove on, we went to my school, then the gatekeeper came out and he said, "what are you doing here? there's been a terrible accident. go back to your house, please." and at that moment, we realised that those people we had seen lying down on the pavements weren't drunk, they were dead.

i had never seen death before. tonnes of poisonous gas leaked from a storage tank at the union carbide factory, the chemical methanol isocyanate was being used to make pesticides. and as the cloud spread through the city, the effects were immediate. 200,000 people, a third of the population found themselves enveloped in a dense, choking fog. we drove past the hospital, the hospital is on a slope. you have to drive up to the hospital. and there were just bodies. the hospital mortuary can't cope with the dead bodies. | many are lined up outside waiting for relatives - to come and claim them. some people were in pain and some people were their eyes were being treated. many complained of suffocation. they need oxygen - to help them breathe, and it's in short supply.

imagine that suddenly your city where you live has lost 8,000 people, 8,000 in one night. but that wasn't the end. doctors are studying 86,000 affected families in bhopal, at least 10,000 people have chronic lung problems. the disease is only now becoming apparent and nothing can stop it. 0n the night of the tragedy, my aunt went into the city and she inhaled a lot of gas, and in 1987, she died. she died of fibrosis of the lungs. hundreds of unemployed gas victims now gather every day in mute protest outside the work shed in an effort to shame the government. people are still suffering.

people are still dying as the consequences of the gas. farah edwards khan on the legacy of bhopal. but we end today with the story of someone who overcame the odds to create a real indian success story in the 1990s, the tech pioneer pramod bhasin had an idea. why couldn't english speaking indians answer the customer service calls of us businesses on the other side of the world and do it at a fraction of the price? it would be the start of india's international call centre industry. you know, i wish i could tell you there was a eureka moment. there wasn't. it seemed so obvious that it was almost surprising that nobody had thought of it earlier. we were the ones who first started the call centre business in india. its economics was so compelling. the scale and the costs at which you could hire people were incredibly low compared to international salaries for the same qualifications.

you could hire a chartered accountant for $29,000. you could hire a masters degree for 5,000, 6,000. but, you know, it'sjust like being able to walk around the streets and find goldust. it was very difficult to convince people initially for the very simple reason that our phone lines didn't work. so in those days, we all had three phone lines at home or two phone lines because one was down all the time. when we went to the telecom authority, of course, they laughed at us and said, are you kidding? we're going to let you put phone lines so that you can dial people all over the world? are you trying to set up a phone company? it's not going to happen, but i'm by nature an optimist. and that's what gave me the confidence, also foolishness, fundamental foolishness, of which i'm very proud. slowly, doggedly, we got the phone line. 0utside this building, if you go, is a true landmark of india. it's a giant satellite dish.

getting that big satellite dish in place was the start in some respects of the entire revolution. the first call centre, we didn't have soundproof stuff, we didn't know how to do that, so we brought saris and curtains and so we went there. it was shambled, wires everywhere, the sari there's calls going on. and we had about 18 people doing called. there was an air of excitement and adventure. men and women working together in a way that doesn't happen in india that much, you know, it was quite liberating, i think, at some level. and people were willing to try. so the calls wouldn't go through, you try again, they would hang up, customers would get mad with us. appliance, one would call us in with a broken down appliance. and our people had never seen a washing machine before. and so they calling them say, my washing machine, you know that thing at the back, it's leaking.

and what the customer was kind of wondering where the hell this call is coming from or what is this funny accent that people are talking to me in? lots of hostility, lots of hostility, and then teaching people how to manage them. don't let them be hostile. if they are hostile, push back after a while. don't get upset yourself. but if somebody gets too rude, feel free to push back. lots of cultural assimilation and training and handholding. we had accent correction training going on, right, and then figuring out what do we call ourselves. if i say, hello, this is pramod, they don't know who the hell that is. if i say hello, this is pete, it's better, right? so not only did we manage, but we obviously thrived. you know, i think when you're in the throes of it, you don't realise what you've got. and what we had was a tiger by the tail. many cities have been built around this industry because these are young kids. and you look at them, they have money, they're

going to spend it. there are kids here who financed homes, colleges, tuition for their relatives. it's changed people's lives. i don't know of anything else that could be a greater thrill. you look at it every day and say, my god, what did we spawn here? pramod bhasin making history and some money, too. that's all from this edition of witness history from here in delhi. we'll be back next time with more first—hand accounts of extraordinary moments in history. but for now, from me and the rest of the witness history team, goodbye. hello again. friday was all about sunshine and showers. the best of the drier weather and sunshine

was across western areas of the uk. but across northern and eastern scotland, eastern areas of england, we did have widespread showers, and some of them really pokey with some hail mixed in as well. at the same time, over the last 24 hours, trouble�*s been brewing out in the atlantic. look at this area of cloud and how it's rapidly developed into what is quite a beautiful looking area of low pressure. however, this area of low pressure is a loitering low pressure system, a particularly slow moving system that's going to be with us for the next five days orso, bringing rain and showers our way. so, an unsettled spell of weather. the rain is beginning to arrive at the moment and will continue to work its way in across parts of england, wales and northern ireland over the next few hours. but as the rain starts falling, the mild air starts moving in, so temperatures 10 degrees by dawn across the southwest. cold with a patchy frost in scotland, but at least there'll be a bright start here. it's in wales where the rain is going to be at its heaviest and particularly across the high ground over the brecon beacons. here, over the weekend, we could see over 100 mm of rain, and that could cause

some localised flooding issues. after a bright start in scotland, the rain is going to be working in here as we go through the afternoon, but at the same time, the rain should ease off towards southeast england and perhaps northern ireland as well. temperatures higher than they've been for quite a while — 17 degrees or so in london, but it's still cold in scotland. 7 or 8 degrees for many here with that persistent rain, and it'll be windy for many of us as well. indeed, through saturday night, there will be further bursts of rain coming and going, but it will be turning increasingly mild through the night as well. temperatures are staying at around 12 or 13 degrees across england and wales, and a frost free night, something we really haven't seen much of over the last month or so. the low pressure still with us for the second half of the weekend, arguably the better of the two days. it's a day of sunshine and showers, but those showers slightly to merge together to give some lengthier outbreaks of rain across western areas. we do have some showers pushing their way eastwards across england from a weak cold front, and that front separates really very mild air

across eastern areas. with the fresher atlantic air, we have most parts around 15—17 degrees. that area of the pressure is loitering, no surprise to see rain and showers for most of the days next week as well. that's your weather.

this is bbc news. i'm tim willcox. our top stories: more bitter clashes injerusalem: as more than 200 people are injured in violence between israeli police and palestinian protesters. afar right a far right israeli mp in the centre of this melee, palestinians unhappy about the settlement of this street that has been here for many years. itjust has been here for many years. it just takes a has been here for many years. itjust takes a spark to make these things ignite. fears in south asia that coronavirus infections are spilling across india's borders into neighbouring countries. how to revive the economy: disappointing job figures in the us but president biden says his economic programme will work.

and what goes up shouldn't always come down —