Is the spate of violent incidents a spontaneous expression of mob anger? Or is it the product of a systematic hate campaign?
Muslims across India marked
Eid al-Fitr this year wearing black bands. Jamiat Ulama-i Hind, a
leading Muslim religious body, cancelled its annual Eid celebration, a
much awaited event for the who is who in New Delhi. The Jamiat and
other organisations also called for Muslims to wear black bands during
their Eid prayers.
This was the first major
show of protest by the Muslims of India to express their anguish and
anger at the continuing violent attacks on members of the their
community across India. The day before Eid, 15-year-old Junaid Khan lost
his life after being attacked by fellow passengers on a train. He was
mocked for being Muslim and a “beef-eater” and was knifed to death.
Mob violence has threatened
not just the Muslim community but also other minorities. In 2016, seven
members of a Dalit family were attacked by cow vigilantes in the state
of Gujarat, which led to mass protests by the Dalit community. Attacks
on Christians remain under-reported, but incidents involving churches
and priests accused of converting Hindus to Christianity continue.
The media has come to call
these incidents “mob lynching”, a term that misrepresents what is really
going on in India. The spate of violent attacks are by far not
spontaneous expressions of mob anger. They are the product of systematic
incitement to violence by Hindu nationalists.
‘Cow protectors’ and ‘cow eaters’
One of the first major cases
to be prominently covered by the media in recent years was the 2015
murder of 50-year-old Mohammad Akhlaq. An angry mob accusing Akhlaq of
eating beef dragged him out of his home in Bishara, a village near the
city of Dadri in the state of Uttar Pradesh, and beat him to death. The attack happened after the local Hindu temple announced on its public address system that a cow had been slaughtered.
The killing of Akhlaq
attracted media attention and wide spread condemnation from political
parties except for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). For more
than a week Prime Minister Narendra Modi kept silent over the incident
and even after he spoke about it, he did not outright condemn it. BJP
officials kept calling it an accident and a result of the genuine anger of the Hindus over slaughtering of a cow.
Since the murder of Alkhlaq,
attacks on Muslims related to cow slaughter or smuggling rumours have
increased. In October 2015, amid protests spurred by rumours of cow
slaughtering, a truck was attacked with a petrol bomb, killing one
Muslim man in Jammu and Kashmir state. In March 2016, two Muslims were
killed and hanged in in the tribal state of Jharkahnd, after being
accused of smuggling cows.
This year, the Indian Express, an English-language daily, identified seven
other incidents between March and May involving lynching of a member of
a minority group, four of them were instigated by cow vigilantes.
On June 22, three Muslims
were killed in West Bengal state after being accused of cow smuggling.
On June 27, a Muslim dairy owner in the state of Jharkhand was attacked
by a mob after being accused of killing a cow; the man was rushed to a
hospital in critical condition after the police managed to save him from
his attackers.
Organised hate campaigns
When I say that mob
lynching is not an apt description of such violence, I seek to underline
the organisation behind most of these incidents. They usually appear to
be sporadic in nature and often a spontaneous reaction of the Hindus
who are generally angry over the reports of cow smuggling and slaughter.
But these cases would not
have been so frequent, if it weren’t for the atmosphere of hate and
suspicion against Muslims, created through a sustained political
campaign. Engaging in “meat politics” and calling for cow protection have been a favourite tool for many Hindu nationalist politicians. Even PM Narendra Modi has indulged in its use.
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak
Sangh (RSS), a Hindu nationalist organisation, affiliated with the BJP
has also had a role to play in whipping up nationalist Hindu sentiments
and encouraging, even if indirectly, cow vigilantism. Other Hindu
nationalist organisations such as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP),
loosely associated with the RSS have gone further and declared: ““Cow
protectors are protectors. How can they be killers? Killers cannot be
protectors.” The RSS never condemns or distances itself from the VHP,
neither does the BJP.
Hinduaisation of
public spaces also helps to mobilise solidarity for the groups
targeting minority communities. Small groups signing religious or
devotional songs or distributing religious pamphlets can be increasingly
seen in local trains, parks and other public spaces. They often
propagate anti-minority rumours and sentiments. Within Hindu
communities, the formation of cow protection groups has intensified in
recent years and has also contributed to the spread of rumours and hate
speech.
These groups encourage
various hateful beliefs about Muslims: that they “cow eaters”, a threat
to Hindu women, and members of terror sleeper cells. They spread
ludicrous fears that the Muslim population is growing and will outnumber
Hindus in India. This atmosphere of sustained hatred against Muslims
makes attacks on them seem spontaneous and the product of mob anger. But
few question why the mob is angry in the first place…
In addition, the general
perception of the justice system as slow and ineffective is making
popular the idea that the people should take justice into their own
hands. The culture of acceptance of summary justice is harnessed by the
Hindu nationalist groups to justify punishments for perceived crimes
committed by Muslims.
The silence of the political class
The media and some observers, including someone as cautious a political analyst as Pratap Bhanu Mehta, feel that the current spate of mob lynching is qualitatively different and is setting a new benchmark.
They see clear complicity of
the people at the helm of power in the violence. When you have a prime
minister who as the chief minister of Gujarat had himself advocated
extra judicial encounters and a man as chief minister of Uttar Pradesh,
Yogi Aditya Nath, who has built his political career propagating
violence against minorities, the mobs feel empowered. They also know
that they enjoy impunity and patronage from the power.
Minorities no longer expect
the ruling BJP to condemn the mob lynchings. What is more worrying is
that other political parties are also not too forthcoming. Other than
one or two tweets and customary condemnation, they have refrained from
visiting the victims or their surviving families. An imaginary Hindu
fear seems to have overpowered the political class and rendered them
paralysed. Their failure to come forward in support of Muslims and
Christians shows that the secular resolve in the Indian body polity has
weakened.
The decision of the Muslim
community to use its most important festival of Eid to lodge its protest
against the continued attacks and lynchings should serve as a wake-up
call to the governments and the political class in general. Muslims are
telling them that they would not take it lying low anymore. It is high
time liberal Hindus and the political parties get their act together, or
it may be too late for India.
