A mob of around 300 Hindus torched mosques and shops belonging to Muslims in India's northern state of Haryana today, apparently angered by rumors that a Muslim family had slaughtered a cow.
Police in Luharu said the mob surrounded the house of the Muslim family suspected of slaughtering the cow, an animal regarded as sacred by Hindus.
Not finding the family at home, the mob torched two mosques and three shops owned by Muslims.
Police said they did not find any evidence of an animal's slaughter at the site.
"The situation is now under control and there was no loss of life," a spokesman said.
The latest incident comes amid a surge in Hindu-Muslim tensions in India, triggered by last month's arson attack on a train carrying Hindu activists by a Muslim mob in the western state of Gujarat in which 58 people were killed.
Some 700 people, most of them Muslims, were killed in reprisals across the state.