Muslim Man Brutally Killed in Unnao During Holi!
Defeat BJP’s Ploy to Turn Religious Festivals into Theatre of Communal Casteist Madness!
In a horrifying incident yesterday, a 45 year old Muslim man Sharif, while heading to a mosque, was brutally assaulted and killed by a mob in Uttar Pradesh’s Unnao as he resisted throwing of colours. In another shocking incident, in Farrukhabad district, six people, including a woman, were injured after miscreants opened fire on Dalits during Holi. Once again, a religious festival has been marked by targeted anti-Muslim and anti – Dalit violence and vandalism in different states.
Festivals that should be celebrated in an environment of peace, harmony and joy are increasingly being turned into theatres of vandalism and violence targeted predominantly against India’s biggest minority community of Muslims.
The Saffron Playbook: Communal Frenzy During Festivals
The pattern of stoking communal frenzy in the run up to religious festivals is unmistakable. First, we have BJP leaders as well as communal elements in administrations making anti-Muslim public announcements. These were accompanied by attacks by saffron mobs on shops owned or run by Muslims. Then religious processions become occasions to play songs calling for genocide of Muslims; to raise Hindu-supremacist slogans and taunts outside mosques; and to vandalize and set fire to mosques as well as Muslim shops and homes. In BJP – ruled states, the open patronage of the state machinery is often on naked display.
This time too, we have seen menacing statements by Bihar BJP MLA Haribhushan Thakur and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath “advising” Muslims to stay indoors during Holi. Haribhushan Thakur’s assertion that Muslims can “avoid coming out on Holi” because “there are 52 Fridays” dismisses the sanctity of Friday prayers and Ramadan, reducing Islamic religious observances to a dispensable inconvenience. Yogi Adityanath’s endorsement of a police officer’s similar “advice” in Uttar Pradesh further legitimizes this communal politics. As many as 189 mosquee in UP were covered in tarpaulin on Holi eve! These instances are telling of state-led hate and violence against people from the Muslim community.
After the mayhem and violence, we are definitely going to see a calculated effort by Godi media to portray the perpetrators (saffron goons) as the victims of violence instead. By turning Hindu festivals into platforms for Islamophobic propaganda and violence, the saffron brigade is seeking to poison the whole of society. We must raise our voice against such propaganda and communal casteist violence.
In Our Own Campus Too
We must not also forget in our own campus, on April 10, 2022, a Sunday, the ABVP violently attempted to prevent mess workers in Kaveri Hostel (JNU) from cooking and serving non-vegetarian meals in a hostel mess, arguing against cooking of non-veg on Ram Navami. The meat vendor was chased away.
When students gathered to protest this blatant imposition of dietary preferences, ABVP goons launched a vicious attack, wielding heavy objects, tubelights, glasses, and other objects, injuring many. This unprovoked assault on students is a disturbing display of intolerance and hooliganism.
On 26 February this year, ABVP repeated the same imposition of food preferences in a hostel in the South Asian University. ABVP goons attacked students in SAU demanding that non-veg food not be served on the day of Shivaratri.
Resist Growing Weaponisation of Religious Festivals
The growing weaponisation of religious festivals is a key feature of communal fascist frenzy and aggression in India. We need to foil this design by all means. The constitutional framework of rule of law must be saved from degenerating into an enabling instrument of fascist violence. On a social and cultural plane we must amplify the voices of reason and harmony to combat this toxic spread of communal venom. And most importantly, we must summon the popular political will and resolve to defeat this fascist game plan and uphold the constitutional objective of secular democracy.
