“UP is now epicentre of politics of hate, bigotry”: 104 ex-bureaucrats

As many as 104 former IAS officers have written a letter to Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath voicing concern over the new 'love jihad' law which would invite imprisonment and penalty over charges of forced conversion. They have urged the UP CM to withdraw the controversial ‘love jihad’ ordinance on interfaith marriages, saying that the state has become the “epicentre of the politics of hate, division, and bigotry".

The ordinance on 'love jihad' aimed at curbing forcible or fraudulent religious conversions, including those for the sake of marriage, got the assent of UP Governor Anandiben Patel just within days of the state cabinet approving its draft.

In a letter to CM Yogi Adityanath, retired bureaucrats wrote: “It has become painfully evident that, in recent years, UP state, once known as the cradle of the Ganga-Jamuna civilisation, has become the epicentre of the politics of hate, division and bigotry and that the institutions of governance are now steeped in communal poison.”

the letter, signed by retired officers which include former National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon, former Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao and former Adviser to the Prime Minister TKA Nair also mentioned that “the anti-conversion ordinance of your state is being used as a stick to victimise, especially those Indian men who are Muslim and women who dare to exercise their freedom of choice."

According to the media reports, Uttar Pradesh Police has made more than one arrest a day since the controversial 'love jihad' law came into effect a month ago. Nearly a dozen FIRs have been lodged since the Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Ordinance, 2020, was notified on November 27.

The law provides for a jail term of up to 10 years for any violations. Under the law, which deals with different categories of offences, a marriage will be declared "null and void" if the conversion of a woman is solely for that purpose.