It has been worst possible year for Muslims in the country

The Modi government 2 has completed one year. And this past one year has been the worst possible year for the Muslim community in the country. I would not hesitate to label it as the darkest possible year, though I have been a witness to the communally charged phases in the recent history of the country —aftermath of the destruction of the Babri Masjid in 1992 and also that of the Gujarat pogrom of 2002.

But the communal unleash had never been so horrifying and brutal as it is today, in 2020. With the political climate turning blatantly communal every day, strangest possible twisted notions of the ‘other’ are doing the rounds. Myths manufactured and facts twisted to wreck the very image of the Indian Muslim. This is not just dangerous but downright insulting and humiliating for the Musalmaans! Totally unacceptable!

Why should the largest minority community of this country sit reduced to this third class status meted out to them by the political rulers who want to rule just about somehow: By distorting if not changing the very narrative, spreading communal virus, whipping up hatred against the other, not controlling the violent attacks and detentions. And then they speak in different voices, to further confuse the masses, and with that halt a collective outcry.

Within weeks after the Modi government took charge last summer ( 2019) there were blatant attacks on the Muslims. The most blatant was the killing of the 24 year old Muslim man, Tabrez Ansari, in Jharkhand. An orphan, he was visiting his ancestral village to get married but before he could get back to his place of work, Pune, he was lynched by a mob of Right -Wing goons.

Tying him to an electric pole, forcing him to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram…Jai Shri Hanuman’, they beat him the entire night. Even when the police came on the scene, instead of shifting Tabrez to the nearest hospital, they threw him into a prison hell -hole. Not just that, they did not arrest any of the Hindutva goons who had assaulted Tabrez. Its only much later, after Tabrez was declared dead and videos of those goons thrashing him went viral, that those typical reactions did the rounds.

Mind you, there has been no stopping of attacks on the Muslims. News reports keep trickling in about incidents where Muslim men and even Madrasa children were forced to chant Hindutva religious slogans. And even after they chanted those slogans, there was little guarantee of their survival. After all, in those videos, bruised and battered Tabrez could be heard chanting ‘Jai Shri Ram…’ yet he was mercilessly beaten for hours, till of course, he lay dead!

The Muslims have sat quiet and subdued, no matter how upsetting the provocations could get. The Babri Masjid -Ayodhya verdict announced in the autumn of 2019, was an emotional setback for the Muslims. Yet they sat all too subdued but worried; after all, it was not just the question of a particular Masjid but the fate of other mosques too in other parts of the country and also that of the very basic survival of Muslims-structures, human and otherwise. Yes, the community was very apprehensive as they were aware of the clampdown in the Kashmir Valley after striking down Article 370 in the first week of August 2019, which relayed the extent to which the government could go to upset an entire region and its inhabitants.

Before the Muslims could contain these setbacks, came in Government of India’s declaration to implement CAA- NRC- NPR, shrouded in complicated layers, while the prominent Hindutva rulers indulged in double or triple speak.

Muslim citizens of this country couldn’t have ever imagined that such a day would come when their citizenship could be questioned. Their very existence in their own country at stake!

And as 2019 winter peaked so did the anti -CAA, NRC, NPR protests. Also, stood out the fact that large numbers from the different communities and professions and age-groups, made it blatantly clear that they do not trust this government’s policies. In fact, Indians settled in the different lands of the world echoed similar sentiments. But there seemed no abatement in the violence. Students and scholars who took part in the anti- CAA protest meets were detained if not arrested. And these arrests are ongoing even today, even in these lockdown Corona- ridden times!

Even before Spring of 2020 could arrive, came in news of the targeted killings of Muslims, in North East Delhi. Yet the hate speech givers and the goon brigades backed by the political mafia were not detained nor arrested despite the fact that there was sufficient evidence to show the role played by particular Right- Wing men who’d come up with communally charged abusive speeches and much more along the strain.

Barely had we recovered from the ghastly violence, came in the coronavirus which also dragged along with it the communal virus with fresh and newer strains to it! This time the target on the Muslim community was along another alibi --- the Tablighi Jamaat men. It was circulated that the Tablighi men spread the coronavirus! Lies and concoctions, morphed images and twisted facts and poisonous propaganda did the rounds, so that hate sentiments against the Muslims get whipped up to those unstoppable limits!

The aftermath of that hate campaign can be seen every single day --- Even Muslim vegetable and fruit vendors are getting targeted and thrashed and not allowed to sell their ware. Ongoing communal frenzy. What, with several BJP legislators from Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, openly and publicly telling the public that they should avoid buying vegetables and fruits from Muslim sellers they should even avoid visiting barber saloons manned by Muslims!

The list of Muslim haters-abusers in the Modi sarkar is long and unending. Not to overlook the harsh comments of politicians and Right- Wing spokespersons who don’t even bother to camouflage their anti-Muslim tirade on the small screen. Yet they manage to get away, with the master minds backing them!

It is obvious that it is part of that big Agenda to spread such levels of hatred against the Muslims that they find it hard if not impossible to survive. And this is what has started happening! Didn’t we see those shots of the cops barging into Muslim homes and beating up entire Muslim families, in Uttar Pradesh, as the anti- CAA protests had peaked and spread out! Didn’t we see many more shots of the State unleashed terror even on the young and women! Didn’t we see shots of the Delhi pogrom!

Poisonous propaganda has already reached an all- time high. Muslims don’t feel safe and secure even whilst surviving in a ghetto or a mohalla. I know mothers who had started stopping their teenage sons from stepping out of the home confines even before coronavirus made entry, as their worries were two fold: the Right- Wing goons and the cops. It’s worrying to hear the Muslims recount the nerve- wrecking conditions they are facing!

As a young Muslim commented, “We’re Musalmaans …anything can happen to us by this sarkar…any charge can be thrown at us. And there’s nobody out there to listen to us!”

Ziya Us Salam’s book on the Tablighi Jamaat

Meanwhile, during the lockdown, the New Delhi based journalist and author, Ziya Us Salaam, wrote an entire book, titled – ‘Inside the Tablighi Jamaat’ (Harper Collins ). It has recently been launched and as the very title relays, it dwells on the Tablighi Jamaat, focusing on the facts and factors to the country’s, if not of the world’s, largest Islamic organisation.