Daily Times

In a video message to a webinar organised by Washington-based advocacy group, Indian American Muslim Council, last week, world-renowned scholar, author, and activist, Noam Chomsky, observed, “The pathology of Islamophobia is growing throughout the West but it is taking its most lethal form in India.”

“Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s right-wing Hindu nationalist regime has sharply escalated the crimes in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK),” he maintained.

“The crimes in Kashmir have a long history and the state is now a brutally occupied territory and its military control by Indian forces in some ways is similar to occupied Palestine,” Chomsky noted.

There could not have been a more realistic portrayal of anti-Muslim policies being pursued by India and the reign of persecution let loose on the people of IIOJ&K.

The BJP regime headed by Narendra Modi is pursuing the implementation of the RSS ideology of “Hindutva” which advocates India for Hindus to the exclusion of the minorities. French Political scientist Christophe Jaffrelot, specializing in South Asian affairs, particularly India and Pakistan, points out that the ideology of the RSS along with other Hindu nationalist movements such as the Arya Samaj and the Hindu Mahasabha thought of Muslims, Christians and the British as “foreign bodies” implanted in the Hindu nation, who were able to exploit the disunity and absence of valour among the Hindus to subdue them.  However, the majority of scholars believe that RSS was actually formed to fight the Indian Muslims. That assertion has been proven right by the actions of the Modi government. The implementation of the National Register of Citizenship in Assam which rendered 1.9 Muslims stateless and the promulgation of the Citizenship Amendment Act speaks volumes about hatred against Muslims.

The ideology of the RSS along with other Hindu nationalist movements thought of Muslims, Christians and the British as “foreign bodies” who were able to exploit the disunity and absence of valour among the Hindus to subdue them.

The international media hurled scathing criticism at the Modi government for promulgating Citizenship Amendment Act. . Even the UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet moved the Indian SC against and informed the Indian government about its application to be a third party in a petition brought by a former civil servant. This development came in the wake of communal riots in Delhi in which more than 50 Muslims were killed.  The condemnation of this mayhem was not only restricted to the international community but even within India, there was a great resentment over the path being pursued by the BJP regime. Former Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in an article published in The Hindu said” India has slid from being a liberal democracy to a Majoritarian state. Lives of nearly 50 Indians were lost “for no reason. Communal tensions were stoked by unruly sections of our society, including the political class. Institutions of law and order have abandoned their dharma to protect citizens. Institutions of justice and the fourth pillar of democracy, the media, have also failed. The fire of social tensions that is spreading across the country can threaten to char the soul of the nation”.

The recurrent incidents of attacks on Muslims by the BJP zealots and the recent situation in the Indian state of Karnatic where the Muslim female students in the Universities are being harassed for wearing hijab–with a nod of approval from the BJP—are irrefutable evidence of the dangerous path that Indian regime has chosen for itself.

Like Hitler Modi did not stop at targeting the Muslims within India. He extended the tentacles of its hatred against Muslims to the Indian Occupied Kashmir.  The BJP in its election manifesto had pledged to undo articles 370 and 35 A of the Indian constitution. On August 5 he finally managed to fulfil his pledge by ending the special status of Kashmir. In his address to the nation on Indian Independence Day he boasted that he had done within seventy days which could not be done in seventy years and that he had fulfilled the dream of Valla Bhai Patel of United India.

It is pertinent to point out that the conscientious voices within India could perceive the dangers inherent in this reckless move and condemned the scrapping of Article 370 of the Indian constitution. Congress strongly opposed the bill when it was presented in the Lok Sabha. One of its senior leaders P. Chidambaram, while speaking in the Rajya Sabha, rightly remarked, “Momentarily you may think you have scored a victory…drum beats, that You will hear on the streets, certainly will encourage you to believe that you have corrected a so-called injustice but history will prove you wrong…. and future generations will realize what a grave mistake this House is making today. This will be a catastrophic blunder. It is a sad day. This will be the black day.”

He appealed to the Modi government not to “dismember the state;” terming it a cardinal blunder.

The unilateral ending of the special status of IIOJ&K, its bifurcation into two territories, their inclusion in the Indian Union, the military siege of the state and the continuation of the killing spree by the Indian security forces, are ranting testimonies of the nefarious designs of the Modi government. Reportedly, more than 400 Kashmiris have been killed since August 5, 2019, during search and cordon operations by the Indian security forces. With a view to change the demographic features of the state, the Indian government has also promulgated a domicile law that allows the Indian citizens to become permanent residents of the state and also eligible for buying property and seeking jobs. The actions taken by the Modi regime in IIOJ&K constitute a brazen violation of the UN resolutions, International law, UN Conventions on Human Rights and the 4th Geneva Convention.

The most worrying factor for the countries of the region, particularly Pakistan is that the hate philosophy being pursued by the Modi government also has very serious implications for peace and security in the region. The Modi government right since its inception has adopted an aggressive posture towards Pakistan as demonstrated on February 26, 2019. The world community particularly the UN as a peacemaking body needs to take immediate notice of what India is doing to the Muslim minority and what it has done in IIOJ&K in blatant defiance of the UN resolutions before the situation gets out of hand. The US and its allies must also remove blinkers from their eyes. The failure of the UN and the powers which can help in the resolution of the Kashmir dispute could lead to catastrophic consequences.

The writer is a former diplomat and freelance columnist.