Modi’s crusade

KARACHI: India has changed. Gone are the days of Gandhi’s non-violent India, where even legitimate protest was expected to be civil and non-violent. A new order exists, one of mass incarcerations, lynching, abuse and systemic oppression. And who are the victims? The 200 million Indian Muslims, who make up nearly 15 per cent of the nation’s population.

India had long prided itself for its secularism and tolerance for all faiths, especially since the addition of the historic Preamble to its Constitution in 1949, which read:

“We, the people of India, have solemnly resolved to constitute India into a Sovereign, Socialist, Secular Democratic Republic and to secure all its citizens justice – social, economic, political; Liberty of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship; Equality of status and opportunity; to promote among them all Fraternity, assuring the dignity of the individual and unity and integrity of the Nation.”

As is self-evident from the rise of Hindu Nationalism in the country, as well as rampant Xenophobia, the Indian Constitution, as it was envisioned by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Damodardas Modi’s predecessors, has long been abandoned. In Modi’s India members of the Muslim community are referred to with dismissive and often Islamophobic terms, social and traditional media is often used to launch campaigns against them, lynch mobs beat and brutalise them, Muslim women are raped, abducted and abused, while Hindutva fanatics sporadically demand they chant an ode to a Hindu God.

These abuses faced by Indian Muslims, who are just as much Indian as any other group, is ever-apparent. They are persecuted mercilessly and asked to prove their loyalty to the nation they were born in. The nation they call home.

While there is violence against other minorities, such as Christians, Sikhs and those belonging to lower-castes in the Indian caste system, the violence inflicted on Muslims is disportitionately high.

Pakistani economist, Mahbubul Haq, who launched the United Nations Human Development Programme, wrote in the programme’s first report: “the real wealth of a nation is its people and the purpose of development is to create an enabling environment for people to enjoy long, healthy, and creative lives.” Clearly, the Modi government believes that these ideals should be applied selectively.

Systemic Oppression

The philosopher Martha Nussbaum argues that human life is categorised by a set of Capabilities – what each person is able to do and how free they are to do these things. She argues that it is a State’s role to ensure that each and every individual in a nation is able to enjoy equal freedoms to meet their full development potential. The key here is to guarantee individuals basic decency and fair treatment. A systems of oppression is one where a dominant group, often the group holding access to power, suppresses a marginalised group’s right to fair treatment and basic decency. This is clearly what is happening in today’s India.

According to the Human Rights Watch (HRW), Indian authorities have adopted a mechanism of legal cover to systematically discriminate against Muslims and ostracise critics of the government. “The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) embrace of the Hindu majority at the expense of minorities has seeped into government institutions, undermining equal protection of the law without discrimination,” maintained HRW South Asia Director Meenakshi Ganguly. She further stated that, “the [Indian] government has not only failed to protect Muslims and other minorities from attacks but is providing political patronage and cover for bigotry.”

The international watchdog further stated that, “the prejudices embedded in the government of the ruling BJP have infiltrated independent institutions, such as the police and the courts, empowering nationalist groups to threaten, harass, and attack religious minorities with impunity.” It also revealed, unsurprisingly, that extremist Hindu groups, most of whom claim to be affiliated with the BJP, have committed numerous assaults against Muslim and other minority groups, in response to rumours that the individuals being lynched sold, bought or killed a cow. Meanwhile, legal institution continue to turn a blind eye.

Following the 2014 win of the BJP, under the leadership of Modi, there has been a steep rise in Hindu Nationalism, which is propelled by Modi’s anti-Muslim rhetoric. Right-wing groups, mirroring the country’s political narrative of intolerance, have been emboldened to oppress and abuse minorities as there is official indifference and complicity in these attacks – with authorities refusing to prevent, investigate or punish this type of mob violence.

The failure of authorities to prevent or investigate attacks against religious minorities has created a climate of impunity which, unless urgently addressed, is likely to further normalize lethal attacks. While such violence is being instrumentalised by the BJP for political gain its continuation is likely to exacerbate a climate of entrenched discrimination, and will have long-lasting social, economic, cultural and political impacts.

The whole ordeal is inexcusable and absolutely horrific. What it is not, however, is surprising. The Modi led BJP is an extreme right-wing party. One that has molded itself around the ideals of the Hindu extremist group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), which was formed in 1925 with the aim to create an ethnically Hindu State in India.

The violence against Muslims in recent years is carried out by vigilante groups affiliated with the Sangh Parivar, a group of Hindu Nationalist organisations – of which the ruling BJP is the political wing. The BJP’s promotion of Hindu nationalism is not only exclusionary towards India’s minorities, but has contributed to an overall climate of intolerance in India.

During his first term in power, there were numerous incidents of Muslims being attacked by so-called ‘cow vigilantes,’ and Modi failed to condemn any of these attacks.  Meanwhile, Prakash Javadekar, a senior BJP leader, told the BBC that, “the government believes that lynching is bad, wherever it happens, but law and order is a state subject and it is their responsibility to deal with it,” which if anyone has ever heard a politician speak, knows is the equivalent of saying: go-ahead.

Following the horrific Delhi attacks that killed 53 people of whom 40 were Muslim, the BJP government did not conduct impartial investigations. In fact most independent watchdogs alleged the BJP leaders incited violence, and that the police were involved in these attacks. Furthermore, despite finally relenting to the demands of the Farmer’s Protests under international pressure, the BJP has done lasting damage towards the Sikh minority in India by vilifying them and calling for investigation against them for leading a separatist movement.

The Rise of Hindu Nationalism

How does such a fanatic government come into power and, more importantly, stay in power? All clues point to Hindutva. The concept of Hindutva was articulated by Indian author and politician VD Savarkar in the 1920s in his book, ‘Hindutva: Who Is a Hindu?’ which outlined the supremacy of Hindus over all other dwellers in India, as their holy lands are in India, whereas the Christian and Muslim holy lands are elsewhere.

The narrative also champions policies towards the creation of a Hindu-only state, as a result of which followers of Hindutva see Indian Muslims as suspicious foreigners despite most of them being descendants of Hindus who converted to Islam and see the creation of Pakistan as the ultimate manifestation of Muslim disloyalty.

According to author Jyotirmaya Sharma, in his book ‘Hindutva: Exploring the Idea of Hindu Nationalism,’ the sixth and arguably most used fundamental of Hindutva is the, “introduction of invective, abuse and contempt as legitimate tools of writing, conversation and public discourse.” This feature is visible throughout political discourse, in communities and on Indian social media spaces, and is often espoused by BJP and RSS politicians, guests on televised progamming and news anchors who subscribe to the Hindutva vision.

While Sharma views Hindutva as a philosophical ideology, it is self-evident that the political practice of Hindutva off-shoots effortlessly from its philosophical counterpart. The idea of Hindu supremacy and ethnocentric conceptions of nationalism are clearly stated in the Hindutva’s call for the ‘Hindu Rashtra’s’ ability to decide who enjoys certain rights and freedoms.

These sentiments started to become mainstream when political tension arose in 1980s which challenged India’s secular model. Following PM Indira Gandhi’s electoral defeat the Indian Congress Party began to use divisive tactics to gain power. Following her assassination, her son Rajiv Ghandi took over, and favoured Hindus. According to renowned political scientist, Kanchan Chandra, “Congress’s sustained move toward Hindu majoritarianism over several decades created fertile ground for the more extreme ideology of the BJP.”

The BJP itself came to power in 1998 elections, with much less radical goals in order to maintain a coalition, which it held until 2004 when the Congress once again took control. However, it continued to peddle extremist ideology in subtle and subversive ways, with back handed remarks and by maligning prominent Muslims in India. In 2014, for the first time ever the BJP won a single-party majority in ‘Lok Sabha,’ the lower house in parliament, which is India’s most influential political body, making Modi, the party’s leader, Prime Minister of India. The party once again secured a majority in 2019 after a divisive campaign filled with anti-Muslim narratives. The Modi government is expected to complete its full term and stay in power until 2024.

Legalising Exclusion

While in its first run the BJP may have put on a more subtle face, its second term has been anything but. Soon after regaining power Modi’s government announced several radical political reforms.

In August 2019, the BJP singed a bill to remove all constitutional autonomy awarded to Indian Illegally Occupied Kashmir (IIOJK). Under this move, the Muslim-majority state is no longer able independently govern itself and restrictions have been imposed which curtail residents basic human rights. The government cut cellular and internet connections for months, leaving the region closed off from the world and carried out massive detentions, house arrests and insurmountable abuse on the people of Kashmir. Those penalised included prominent political figures and pro-separatist activists, as well as, ‘suspicious’ individuals and dissidents.

In December 2019, the Indian parliament passed the Indian Citizenship Amendment Act. The Act allows for fast-track Indian citizenship for Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhist, Jain, Parsis, and Christian migrants from neighboring Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. However, such facilities are not awarded to Muslims, making the law discriminatory and the first law that requires a religious criteria for citizenship. The Modi government has argued that the law is designed to protect vulnerable religious minorities that face persecution in Muslim-majority countries. Critics have said that the law violates India’s secular constitution by institutionalising religious discrimination.

In its 2019 manifesto, the BJP promised the institution of a National Register of Citizens (NRC). The NRC, created in 1950, was a special case register which was used in the state of Assam to determine whether residents living in the province were Indian citizens or migrants from modern-day Bangladesh. In 2019, the updated register in Assam declared two million people stateless. If a nation-wide NRC were to be implemented, all Indians, specifically from the looks of it, Indian Muslims, would be required prove their citizenship. Experts claim that many Muslims would find themselves stateless due to lack of necessary documentation which they cannot acquire as they are not eligible for fast-tracked citizenship under the Citizenship Amendment Act. Meanwhile, Indian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Raveesh Kumar, had the audacity to state that, “India is proud of its secular credentials, and its status as the largest democracy and a pluralistic society with a longstanding commitment to tolerance and inclusion.”

Furthermore, in 2020, Modi laid the cornerstone for the construction of a new Hindu temple on the site of the historic Babri Masjid. In 1992, the mosque was torn down by Hindu militants in Ayodhya and an estimated 3000 people, most of them Muslim, died in the ensuing riots. The site has been a disputed location for years as Hindus claim that the mosque was built by Mughals at the site of the birthplace of the Hindu deity Ram. Modi’s decision to build a temple at this location is one of the many anti-Muslim laws his government has championed.

Meanwhile, the United Kingdom based think tank, Minority Rights Group, revealed that Muslims in India are disproportionately incarcerated and much more likely to receive capital punishment in comparison to other religious and ethnic group. The think tank also revealed that police personnel think Muslims are naturally prone towards committing crime, with one in every two police officials echoing these sentiments.

Communal Violence

With legal cover and nationalist rhetoric rampant, instances of communal violence are at an all-time high in India. These have included ‘Ghar Wapsi’ (homecoming) campaigns, where religious minorities, particularly, Muslims, have been forcefully converted to Hinduism; ‘Gau Rakshaks’ (cow protectors) persecuting anyone who buys, sells, butchers or eats cows; and crackdown against Muslims in general for alleged crimes against the communities they are living in.

Many of these incidences of communal violence have only come to light due to viral videos released on social media, which show Muslim vendors and traders being subjected to assaults.

On June 5 a 2-minute clip showed 72-year-old Abdul Samad Saifi being offered a ride in a rickshaw by a few men of the outskirts of Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh. The men then took Saifi to an abandoned spot and allegedly beat him for hours and forced him to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’ (hail Lord Ram) and ‘Vande Mataram’ (I praise thee, Mother). The men also cut the victim’s beard with scissors. On September 23, two Muslim men were brutally beaten for carrying meat in Mathura in Uttar Pradesh. In the same month in Madhya Pradesh a Muslim bangle seller, Tasleem Ali, was beaten for selling his products in the Hindu locality under a Hindu name, allegedly. A week before this incident, Ujjan dwellers forced a Muslim scrap dealer to shout ‘Jai Shri Ram’ (hail Lord Ram). In Lucknow, a horse carriage owner was forced to chant ‘Death to Pakistan’ on the basis of a fake claim that he had hoisted a Pakistani flag on his carriage.

Earlier this year, a viral video showed a terrified young girl crying and clinging to her Muslim father as a mob continued to assault the man, in Kanpur. The shocking footage showed a 45-year-old rikshaw driver being brutally beaten and dragged through the streets while his young daughter begged the mob to stop. The assailants forced the elderly man to chant ‘Hindustan Zindabad’ (Long Live India) and ‘Jai Shri Ram’ (hail Lord Ram). Despite the man complying the mob continued to beat him. In March, a harrowing video of a 14-year-old Muslim boy being assaulted for drinking water from a Hindu temple also went viral. In all these cases, the assaulters are alleged members of Hindu right-wing groups, that have been emboldened under Modi’s reign of terror.

In August of this year, a protest organised by BJP leader and Supreme Court lawyer Ashwini Upadhyay turned into a demonstration against Muslims. The event led to the creation of an angry mob that shouted slogans which referred to Muslims as ‘pigs’ and called for ‘mass slaying’ of the minority. Other slogans at the event included chants of ‘jab mulle kaate jayenge, wo Ram Ram chillayenge’ (when Muslims will be slain, they will chant lord Ram’s name) and ‘Hindustan mein rahna hoga, to Jai Shri Ram kahna hoga’ (if you want to live in India, you must say hail Lord Ram).

Furthermore, several states have recently introduced laws to curb, ‘love jihad,’ a Islamophobic phrase used to imply that Muslim men prey on Hindu women to convert them to Islam through marriage. The subsequent laws are being used to harass Muslim men in inter-faith relationships.

All this extremist violence occurs in the backdrop of socio-cultural discrimination. Access to renting and buying property, labelling Muslims as ‘terrorists’ and lack of support from institutions is the reality of life for Muslims.

Gender Based Violence

Adding the layer of gender to this dynamic creates even more problems for India’s Muslim women. Muslim women are being targeted by online extremist for their religious affiliation through online harassment and bullying.

An application called ‘Sulli Deals’ has shared images and information of more than 80 Muslim women without their knowledge. The application’s creators have encouraged visitors to claim a ‘Sulli’ – a derogatory term used by right-wing Hindu trolls for Muslim women – calling the women, ‘deals of the day.’ Women listed on the platform include many notable activists, journalists, as well as a female member of the Congress.

“The way they [Hindu far-right groups] sexualise [us] is the only way they believe they can shame and silence Muslim women online. We are supposed to be ‘oppressed’ in their books – so they think, ‘How dare we speak out for ourselves?’” journalist and activist Rana Ayyub, , told Al Jazeera.

Sania Ahmed, another media professional who found herself on the horrific application, revealed that this is all old hat. “Last year, there was a poll running where a Hindutva account asked ‘Which of the Sanias should I choose for my harem?’ “We kept reporting the poll, but it ran for 24 hours,” stated Ahmad. She further revealed that the results were eventually published and the comments stated things like, “I want to chop off their heads and use them to decorate my wall.’”

Ghazala Jamil, an assistant professor at the Centre for the Study of Law and Governance at Jawaharlal Nehru University, maintained that, “in India particularly, this tendency has combined with widespread impunity especially to overt violence against Muslims, women and Dalits. In my reading, this virtual ‘auction’ is an escalation of trolling. It is reminiscent of slave trade/trafficking on the one hand and a lynching in [a] public place on the other.”

Last January, Amnesty International India reported that nearly 100 female politicians were subjected to harassment on Twitter and faced unprecedented levels of online abuse. These women were not only targeted for their views but for their gender and religious identities.

In the same year, a 20-year-old Muslim woman named Gulnaz Khatoon was burned alive after she refused to marry a Muslim man, in the province of Bihar.

Covid Hysteria

With nearly two years of the global coronavirus pandemic, it is a well-documented fact that Muslims were targeted in India for the spread of Covid-19. Muslim properties were targeted and small traders were subjected to abuse. Fruit-sellers in particular were beaten and shunned from many Hindu majority areas.

Furthermore, Muslims were targeted when a religious gathering led to a rise in cases in India, while no such claims were made when the Kumbh Festival occurred, despite it being a major super-spreader event. The term ‘corona- jihad’ began being used to refer to the idea that Muslims spread coronavirus. This then led to ‘roti-jihad’ where many members of the public and BJP claimed that Muslim cooks spat on bread before serving it to Hindus.

Shunning Allies

An added layer to this is the persecution of civilian allies. Anyone who attempts to shield Muslim minorities, and speaks out against bigotry is harshly punished. This is apparent in the recent attacks by internet trolls against cricketers Mohammad Shami and Virat Kohli. Shami faced death threats after India’s loss to Pakistan and Kohli’s infant daughter was threatened with rape by Hindu nationalists.

The media, when it is not state-controlled, has also faced a lot of censorship when it comes to highlighting the plight of Indian Muslims. Following the Farmers Protests, journalist began reporting on the matter. This led to the authorities filling baseless cases against them. They also ordered that internet service be shut down in several areas and directed Twitter to block the accounts of as many as 1,200 journalist and news outlets, some of which Twitter later restored.

In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court declared that an individual’s right to privacy was intrinsic and could not be compromised on, as the rule of law ‘guarantees against authoritarian behavior.’ Simultaneously the authorities have harassed and filed sedition charges and criminal defamation lawsuits against activists, academics, journalists, and others critics of government. Threats of legal action and accusations of corruption have caused many journalists and media outlets to self-censor. By November this year, the Indian government has imposed 60 internet shutdowns, 27 of which were in IIOJK.  Furthermore, the police continues to crackdown against Muslim journalists and has even filed multiple FIRs against them. According to the HRW, “authorities in India have adopted laws and policies that systematically discriminate against Muslims and stigmatise critics of the government. Prejudices embedded in the government of the ruling Hindu nationalist BJP have infiltrated independent institutions, such as the police and the courts, empowering nationalist groups to threaten, harass, and attack religious minorities with impunity.”

Kashmir

Meanwhile, Kashmir continues to face its own set of troubles. Over 1,400 civilians have been arrested this year in IIOJK. There has also been a surge in extra judicial killings, which serve as irrefutable evidence that India is violating international law. “Kashmiris are caught in unending violence from attacks by militants and abuses by [Indian] authorities and security forces,” according to the HRW South Asia Director Ganguly.

According to the comprehensive dossier recently released by the Federal government of Pakistan, the extent of the violence and illegality in the occupied territory is frightening beyond measure. The report, which was a joint effort of 32 human rights watchdogs and 14 reports provided by Pakistan, revealed that India currently has 900,000 troops stationed in IIOJK.

The dossier stated that there have been 3,432 cases of war crimes in which 1,178 troops were involved. These included one major general, four inspector generals, seven deputy inspector generals, five brigadiers, 31 colonels, as well as 188 majors and captains.

It further outlined that over 96,000 extra judicial killings have taken place since 1989. There have been roughly 162,000 cases of arbitrary arrests and torture, over 25,000 pellet gun injuries, as many as 11,250 women were raped and over 108,000 children have been orphaned. The document also details the existence of 8,652 unmarked mass graves in 89 villages of IIOJK.

Dreams of Secular India

Not all Hindus are anti-Muslim and not all those who voted for the BJP are extremists. However, if Modi sees through his term things are likely to turn for the worst for India’s Muslim minority. The BJP has explicity put forward policies that at their best lead to ignorance of the rights of Muslims in India and at their worst lynching and persecution.

Currently India, which prides itself as the only ‘true democracy’ in the region, is failing miserably at the pursuit of the same. With policies that remind one of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia, that are meant to inherently target minority groups and punish dissidents, the country hardly holds any standing to call itself a democracy at all. The abuse of power under the BJP is alarming and Modi’s rhetoric is spewing hatred and sprouting anti-Muslim sentiments in in India across the board. If India continues to ride this nationalist tide, then a genocide against its minorities, particularly Muslims, is not far away.