Uttarakhand: BJP youth wing tirade against Kashmiri traders at Mussoorie

Keeping up the tirade against the Kashmiri Muslim traders, the Mussoorie unit of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM), an affiliate of the ‘Sangh Parivar’ held a demonstration on Monday against Kashmiri Muslim traders in Mussoorie.

The workers of the BJYM raised slogans against Kashmiri Muslim traders and sought their expulsion from the hill station. Interestingly, however, in their memorandum submitted to the SDM of Mussoorie, Meenakshi Patwal, they demanded verification of the antecedents of Kashmiris as well as Muslims coming from outside and doing business.

Rakesh Rawat, president of the Mussoorie unit of BJYM said that after the Pulwama attack and the ‘anti-national’ posts by some Kashmiri students on social media, the presence of Kashmiri traders was seen as a security threat. He demanded that Kashmiri traders should vacate and leave the hill stations at the earliest.

In the memorandum submitted to the SDM, they demanded the verification of Kashmiris and other Muslims doing business in the hill station. They asked the administration and the police to check the antecedents of Kashmiris and Muslims coming from the neighbouring districts of Uttar Pradesh to Mussoorie.

Earlier also in the year 2017, the local traders association had given an ultimatum to Kashmiri traders doing business in Mussoorie to leave by February 2018 following an alleged celebration by them on the victory of the Pakistan cricket team against India during the Champions trophy. The 20 Kashmiri traders who have been doing business in Mussoorie for the past many years have denied the allegations. The issued was sorted out with the intervention of the administration and the police and the ultimatum was withdrawn. Since the advent of  the BJP government in Uttarakhand, the attacks on Muslims have increased on some pretext or other throughout the entire Garhwal region.

On the other hand, some of the colleges in Dehradun under pressure from the DAV College Students Union President who is from the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), another RSS affiliate, has given a written undertaking that they will not allow any Kashmiri student to seek admission in the next academic session following a rowdy protest by the right wing groups against Kashmiri students following the Pulwama attack on February 14.