Hindutva ideologues shun flowers, incense; purify temple with gau mutra

Maharashtra chief minister Eknath Shinde jumped the gun earlier in May when he ordered a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to look into allegations by Sakal Hindu Samaj (SHS) that a group of Muslims had tried to force their way into the Trimbakeshwar Temple in Nashik district of Maharashtra on May 13, supposedly to offer a chadar (woven net of flowers) to the deity. 

The local police had a different take and were quick to endorse the tradition, said to be a century old, of Muslims offering fragrant joss sticks to the deity on the occasion of Urs in Hazarat Gulab Shah Baba's dargah every year.

Mateen Sayed, 40, confirmed to the National Herald that he had grown up witnessing the tradition. His grandfather would lead the Urs procession, which would begin around 7 in the evening and culminate at the dargah. The temple is en route, and when the procession would reach the temple — this year they did so around 9 pm — they would stop at the temple gate and light the joss sticks there before proceeding to the dargah.

The rumour that they had tried to force their entry was initiated by outsiders to the locality. Following the chief minister's knee-jerk decision to order a SIT inquiry and the public uproar that followed, the Sayed family and other local Muslims have decided to voluntarily give up the syncretic tradition from next year. 

In a comical twist, members of the Shiv Sena (SHS) reportedly sprinkled gau mutra in the temple premises to purify it. Their theology clearly believes that a gift of either flowers or incense is not acceptable to the deity.

However, Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) leaders in the state smell a method in the madness...  

There have been at least seven instances — beginning March this year — of attempts in the state to disturb the communal peace with false rumours, fake narratives or hasty government action. The MVA leaders believe that these are timed deliberately ahead of the much-anticipated BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) election and amidst uncertainty around the Shinde government's legitimacy.

The Eknath Shinde government and deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis are stirring the communal pot in Maharashtra, alleges National Congress Party (NCP) leader Ajit Pawar. “Community and political leaders in Nashik district interacted with people living around the Trimbakeshwar temple and confirmed that the tradition of offering joss sticks was ancient," he said, accusing home minister Devendra Fadnavis of failing to control communal elements in the state. 

The president of the Maulana Azad Vichar Manch, Husain Dalwai said, “During the MVA government, Hindus and Muslims lived in peace but because the Muslim community openly supported Uddhav Thackeray, communal elements are out to settle scores.” The former MP said he suspected Fadnavis had a role in encouraging the spate of false narratives.

Maulana Mehmood Daryabadi, general secretary of the All India Ulema Council, said, "It looks like the BJP is polarising the state for the 2024 elections."

Significantly, the state government has taken no action against the notorious owner of a TV channel that broadcasts programmes in both Hindi and Marathi which has been pulled up for hate speech by the Delhi High Court just last week for uploading a contentious video. The clip showed an unidentified woman who had allegedly thrown an egg at a poster of Lord Rama. The channel owner promptly named the woman ‘jihadi khatoon (jihadi woman)’.    

Aurangabad police commissioner Manoj Lohia, however, was quick to take to social media and identify the woman as Shilpa Garud, a clerk at a local post office, who is mentally unstable and undergoing treatment. The owner of the same channel had in a public function delivered an inflammatory speech and called for the genocide of non-Hindus.

However, a young Muslim boy was arrested recently for a social media post in which he had written “Tum naam badal rahe ho, magar itihas nahi badal paoge (you can change names but you can't change history)" in a reference to the change of name from Aurangabad to Sambhaji Nagar.

Meanwhile, false narratives around the film The Kerala Story also instigated communal violence in Akola and resulted in the death of one person and injuries to others.