Daily Times

Atrocities against Muslims and Hindu-Muslim communal riots are not an uncommon sight in India but ever since the Modi regime held sway, Hindu extremism has touched new heights. Indian Muslims are persecuted and victimised in every field of life. With the sweeping emergence of Hindutva, they find their social, political and communal space shrinking in the so-called biggest democracy of the world.

Though all minorities are being oppressed in India, Muslims have become a specific target of ferocious violence that runs rampant in society. Now, terrifying slogans are being heard all across India.

A demonstration led by former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and Supreme Court lawyer, Ashwini Upadhyay, to demand the “scrapping of India’s colonial-era laws” turned into a protest against Muslims. A charged crowd incited others to resort to violence against the minority community at Jantar Mantar. A video showed how demonstrators were calling Muslims “pigs.” There is a call for mass-slaying the minorities, especially Muslims. Those caught are forced to utter “Ram Ram” if they wished to live in India. Cow vigilantes brutalise Muslims on the mere suspicion of cow slaughter. The charged mob utters blood-chilling slogans, showing the dark face of a deviously shining India.

Prime Minister Modi is a staunch follower of the RSS philosophy. RSS is an ultra right-winged Hindu nationalist party. Since its establishment in 1925, it has propagated its fenced-in creed of Hindutva. Though it was banned after the murder of Mahatama Gandhi (whose killer belonged to the RSS), it managed to hop into the political arena under diverse shades. The present ruling party in India, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), is its political wing.

From Gujrat carnage to the burning of the Samjhota Express and the demolishment of the Babri Mosque, there remain many bloodstains on Modi’s name. Interestingly, he was excluded from the visa list in the US under a provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act. After winning the elections, and with changing political and strategic dynamics of the region, he became a blue-eyed boy of the Americans, especially when they needed India to control China.

From Gujarat carnage to the burning of the Samjhota Express and the demolishment of the Babri Mosque, there remain many bloodstains on Modi’s name.

India and its scores of websites and media houses are feeding and sponsoring Islamophobia. This network counts on propagated lies to make the world believe. India uses advanced technology to set up 750 websites under ANI and SG (Srivastav Group) to vilify Pakistan. The EU DisinfoLab report said: “The actors behind the operation hijacked the names of others, tried to impersonate regular media such as the EU Observer, used the letterhead of the European Parliament, registered websites under avatars with fake phone numbers, provided fake addresses to the United Nations, created publishing companies to print books of the think-tanks they owned. This repeated, consistent, wide-scale, lying through fake identities and using dead professors and defunct NGOs created a picture of Pakistan that was full of violence, terror and danger.”

Hindutva groups and other organisations held a maha panchayat, or congregation, in Dwarka to protest against the construction of the Haj house. Slogans were shouted in the presence of Narsinghanand Saraswati, a priest notorious for communal hate speeches. Hate speeches by young Bharatiya Janata Party leader, Kapil Mishra, had fueled horrific riots in northeast Delhi in which 53 people were killed. The majority of them were Muslims. More than 80 Muslim women in India, who are powerful voices on Twitter, found they had been put up “for sale” online on an app called “Sulli Deals.”

There is no doubt that Modi is the sworn enemy of Pakistan. He and his like-minded groups are attacking Pakistan from all directions. For the last many years, they have tried to create mayhem in Pakistan through Afghanistan. They gave full-fledged support to terror mongers but the world conscience opted to connive at it, though Pakistan put undeniable proofs of Indian involvements in attacks against Pakistan. In fact, India supports money laundering and terror financing, but the world fails to take any action on it.

Now, frustrated at the recent developments in Afghanistan, where its years’ investment is being wasted and sponsored terrorist groups are being noosed, India is expected to be more violent at home. Muslims of India, particularly Kashmiris, may have to bear its awaking wrath more than ever. But it should remember that guns can kill men, not ideologies and passion.

The writer is an old Aitchisonian who believes in freedom of expression, a freelance columnist, entrepreneur and social activist