India - Karnataka: Far Right Srirama Sene activists assault students

The Hindu, Hassan, September 21, 2013

Moral policing in Hassan

Staff Correspondent

Srirama Sene activists assault students

In yet another instance of moral policing in Karnataka, members of a Hindutva outfit allegedly assaulted a student for talking to a girl from another religion near M. Krishna School for Blind in Hassan on Friday.

They took the boy and the girl to a police station and demanded that a case be booked against the boy for “attempting to convert the Hindu girl into Christianity.” The police, however, refused to do so.

Srirama Sene district president Janekere Hemanth told The Hindu that he saw the boy, a student, talking to the girl for more than hour in a secluded place and their behaviour was “inappropriate.” The boy belonged to another religion. “We told the police to book a case against him for trying to convert her to his religion. We can’t allow such things to happen,” he said.

Kattaya Shivakumar, leader of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, who was also present with Mr. Hemanth when the incident occurred, claimed that there were “many instances of Hindu girls being lured by boys of other religion” in Hassan.

Ravi D. Channanavar, Superintendent of Police, said: “They were classmates. We let them go without registering any case.” When his attention was drawn to the act of moral policing, he said he would look into it.

Keywords: moral policing in Karnataka, Hassan moral policing, Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Srirama Sene