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Uploaded on March 07, 2016
A foul-mouthed, ill-behaved, boorish lot
Dr Mohammad Manzoor Alam
For all its appearances, the country is slowly, but steadily, being pushed towards an undeclared civil war. However, I must qualify my statement at the outset: because civil war is a precise term denoting an internal war in a country between a dominant, aggressive and tyrannical group and a less powerful but equally determined group that seeks to resist the unfair use of power and tyranny of the former.
What is happening in India is not really a bipolar or multipolar internal conflict, but a one-sided steady aggression by Hindutva extremists (almost always patonised by the state, right from the top executive to police and intelligence) against Muslim, Christians, Dalits, Adivas and other marginalised groups. Murders, violent attacks, rapes and kidnappings of women of these groups has become the norm today.
Public insults on Christianity and Islam is heaped by RSS, VHP and BJP workers and leaders on a daily basis. Kidnapping of Muslim girls around Gorakhpur and eastern UP by Mahant Adityanath’s specially-trained goondas is a common incident, recurring virtually on a weekly basis. Delegations from Muslim organisations have often visited the area and found every allegation true. Adityanath is a BJP MP whose hooliganism has terrorised Muslims of eastern UP.
As Adityanath is the blue-eyed boy of Mulayam Singh Yadav, the state administration does not touch him. Being a Sanghi he has got the reassurance of power at the Centre. One does not have to be extraordinarily attentive to know that after the NDA came to power elements like Adityanath have been emboldened beyond measure. They can create havoc as and when they like with a great sense of impunity.
The most tragic part of all this is that Mulayam Singh Yadav, who has flourished over the years with clear support of Muslims, has been supporting not only Adityanath, but a host of other rabble-rousers in their campaigns to harass religious minorities. Even in Muzaffarnagar pogrom people could see Mulayam Singh Yadav’s and his son Akhilesh Yadav’s backing behind Sanghis in their attacks on Muslims.
Mulayam Singh Yadav has emerged as the patriarch of a political dynasty that is larger in sheer size than the much maligned Gandhi-Nehru dynasty. The very foundation of the Yadav dynasty is laid on an assured Muslim support. Keeping that in view Mulayam’s backing to anti-Muslim villains is particularly disappointing.
For whatever reasons, since Independence never did anti-Muslim hooliganism stop for a day. Consistently, the Sangh has been behind all the incidents of organised anti-minority violence and seldom is anybody punished for harming Muslims.
Such attacks never ceased completely, but do spike dramatically every now and then. Today, once again we are witnessing a surge in intimidation and bullying of Muslims. Use of intemperate, despicably outlandish statements against minorities by Sanghis–right from field workers to MLAs, MPs and ministers has become a daily routine. Never does the top leadership of the Sangh, in and outside the government, even reprimand them, much less initiate action against them.
As a result, they are busy overtime creating an enemy image of minorities, Dalits and Adivasis. They are openly imparting weapons training to RSS and its other cadres like Durga Vahini and Bajrang Dal. They are announcing that the training is being given for fighting against Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). However, people know that as there is no ISIS in India they are being trained to initiate a civil war against the religious minorities, Dalits and tribals.
On a daily basis they are provoking Muslims through insults and attacks on their person, properties and religious places. Christians, too, are similarly targeted. Dalits and tribals are being targeted differently. All this is being done to trap the victims if they react in similar fashion.
The habitual offenders like Praveen Togadia, Sadhvi Prachi, Sakshi Maharaj, Adityanath and Kamlesh Tiwari are joined everyday by new offenders. Recently, Union minister of state for human resource Shankar Katheria declared menacingly in Agra that “a final war with Muslims is due.” BJP leaders and government took no action against him. In fact, BJP gave him a clean chit.
The BJP MP from Karnataka, Anant Kumar Hegde, added to the provocation by saying Islam is the root of terror and thus it has to be eradicated. Nobody took notice of this blatant hate speech, much less initiate action against the man for his illegal and unconstitutional conduct.
It seems as if we are living in a state of anarchy. There is no action against these people. In fact, this is already a civil war, a civil war that has only one side, that of the vicious aggressor.
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