Residents protest against “foreigners” in Purola town, Uttarkashi district.
While the weather is delicious in the mountainous state of Uttarakhand the current tourist season, it has also been a season of “Islamophobia” with vigor as the state government of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its affiliated “Sangh Parivar” have attempted to slander and vilify the Muslim minority network under futile pretexts.
From the “Mazar Jihad” (ground jihad) introduced through the state government opposed to the graves of the state’s Muslim saints, “Love Jihad” and demographic adjustments and even invasion through Rohingya Muslims are invoked to attack the minority community. Every other day, boos are created in that regard. The marriage of the daughter of a BJP leader from Pauri Garhwal to a Muslim child by mutual consent also provided enough ammunition to the Hindu right to shout the “Love Jihad” scandal and force the annulment of the wedding planned for May. 28. .
The most recent case is in the city of Purola, Uttarkashi district, on May 28, where 42 Muslim investors were forced to flee after 3 days of protests through local threats and an ultimatum to “foreigners” to resign. This happened after two boys, namely Obaid, a Muslim and Jitender Saini, were captured through the locals along with a local ninth-class girl.
Residents mobilized through affiliates of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) alleged that it was a case of “Love Jihad” when the duo took the woman to Vikasnagar for the wedding. Drum beats, panchayats and edicts were passed to expel “foreigners”.
The posters gave the impression in department stores owned by members of the minority network to leave and leave before June 15, 2023 in Purola. Posters affirming the call for “Devbhoomi Raksha Abhiyan” warned the “Love Jihadis” to leave their department stores until June 15. , when Indian teams will call a “Mahapanchayat” on the subject, and in case they don’t, they will count on time.
A poster pasted at one of the Muslim-owned retail outlets to be left before June 15, 2023.
They were also marked with crosses in black paint. Muslim-owned forums were also broken. Symptoms of some “foreign-owned” retail outlets were also removed. Following the threats, local media reported that, under pressure from the threats, 42 Muslim investors engaged in small businesses left the city on May 30.
Nine shop owners had asked their Muslim tenants to leave their premises because of the alleged persuasion of Swami Darshan Bharati, a right-wing Hindu leader who had spoken out against the minority community. Seven of those investors have packed their products and are waiting to be transported. A merchant dealing in fabrics left his premises on June 7, 2023. Local police have registered prosecutions opposed to those who put up posters and police officers have been deployed in the city.
A Muslim merchant in Purola left his next threats on June 7, 2023.
A delegation of local Muslim investors also met with the local Justice of the Peace branch and requested coverage to open their department stores and businesses, but to no avail. Arpan Yaduvanshi, SP, Uttarkashi district, said the defense of the Muslim minority was ensured through the large police deployment.
In a similar incident in the town of Gauchar in Rudraprayag district, other Muslims from Meerut district in Uttar Pradesh who tried to flee with a local woman were arrested, prompting protests and demonstrations through right-wing Hindu organizations opposed to “Love Jihad”. The Muslim boy arrested and sent to prison.
Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami said no one would be allowed to vitiate the Uttarakhand environment and that “Love Jihad” and “Mazar Jihad” would be tolerated in Uttarakhand.
In the city of Piran Kaliyar, Haridwar district, members of Hindu organizations were offended by an alleged friendly date between a Hindu woman and a Muslim boy on June 1 and created an uproar.
The ruling BJP and its associate “Sangh Parivar” have already embarked on their attempt and proven strategy of spreading “Islamophobia” in the mountainous state of Uttarakhand ahead of next year’s Lok Sabha elections.
Interestingly, a video is circulating of a prominent cardiologist from Dehradun, an RSS worker. In the alleged video, the doctor is heard predicting that Uttarakhand will have another “Kashmir” in the next five years. He is even heard claiming that mosques have sprung up in Kedarnath and Badrinath, the prominent Hindu pilgrimage sites and that “thousands of Rohingya Muslims have settled in Dehradun. “No action has been taken through the state government to oppose such blatant incitement to hatred.
The ruling BJP had already effectively tested the “Gujarat” formula of creating among Muslims in the Hindu-majority upper caste state of Uttarakhand by reversing polling trends and winning the 2022 Assembly elections in March 2022.
The slogan this time is “Mazar jihad,” which was invented by Uttarakhand’s leading minister, Dhami, the main beneficiary of the party’s electoral strategy in last year’s Assembly elections. The problems of “Love Jihad” and adjustments in the demographics of the state due to the “invasion” of Muslims are also invoked.
A “mazar” being demolished in Uttarakhand.
Since Chief Minister Dhami’s announcement, the forestry branch and administration have demolished more than 325 “Mazars,” some more than a century old, on forest and public lands over the past month. Some Hindu temples were also removed, many prominent Hindu shrines in the forest remained intact. The Nainital High Court also refused to remedy the encroachments on public lands.
“We are not opposed to anyone, but intrusions into the ‘Mazars’ call or anything else will not be allowed. We will not allow jihad on earth to thrive. We, in law, will not allow anyone to appease. “The leader announced.
Over the past 3 months, articles have circulated in print and social media about the proliferation of illegal “Mazars” and Muslim settlements on the plains of the state. Even some national TV channels close to the ruling regime have begun broadcasting campaigns about illegal “Land Jihad. “”Mazars” in the state.
He alleged that more than a thousand illegal ‘Mazars’ had given the impression and, to slander the Congress party, charged that they had given the impression under the Congress regime in 2004. Interestingly, the main opposition, the Congress, did not perceive and respond to the BJP’s strategy. The leaders of the congressional parties, in addition to those of the state, are afraid to take a position on anything that has to do with Muslims for fear that they will be presented as pro-Muslim. Congressional leaders are even afraid to comment on Purola’s incidents.
On the one hand, the BJP and the “Sangh Parivar” effectively carried out the “Islamophobic” crusade on social media and on the ground.
No member of the Congress from the main opposition asked about the allegations of illegal “Mazars” and “Madarassas” reported through Chief Minister Dhami. Given that the BJP has ruled the state since March 2017, no one in Congress has asked why the illegal “Mazars” have given the impression or, if they were there before, what measures have been taken in the last six years.
The BJP had its back against the wall in several state-related disorders, adding the heinous murder of Ankita Bhandari through the son of a senior RSS official, the factor of leaked documents from recruitment exams and the involvement of BJP leaders in them, emerging unemployment and the lathi rate on unemployed youth seeking action in scams, deterioration of fitness infrastructure and land subsidence in places. However, the BJP needs to circumvent these disorders by raising frivolous “Islamophobic” disorders. Interestingly, no one in the state, fearful of wasting the votes of the majority community, is willing to call a spade a spade, unless they are left-wing parties and leaders.
The factor of marrying the daughter of Yashpal Benam, a BJP leader from Pauri Garhwal, to a Muslim child, with the mutual consent of both families, has also given enough fuel to the Hindu right to raise the specter of “Love Jihad”. Endemic virulent crusade introduced into social media, and Hindu organizations organized panchayats and threatened to physically prevent marriage. Yashpal Benam, who had circulated the wedding invitation card that triggered the crisis, had to cancel the wedding, respecting public opinion. the child and woman in question are graduates of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Roorkee, and work together in a personal enterprise.
BJP daughter Yashpal Benam’s marriage card with a Muslim boy, which has caused a furor in Uttarakhand.
Van Gujjar’s small Muslim network also attacked. A “dharm sabha” organized through “Rudra Sena” in Tiuni in April 2023. The hate speech called for an economic boycott of minorities, a ban on the installation of “no sanatanis” in the state. And he declared that “peace cannot triumph in the world until all ‘jihadists’ are eliminated. The ‘Rudra Sena’ had threatened the Muslim nomads ‘Van Gujjar’ who had lived there for a long time to leave the area. The management not anything under the pretext of not receiving complaints.
Supreme Court lawyers wrote to the governor asking him to act. Even earlier, after the hate speech in Haridwar ‘Dharam Sansad’ in December 2021, police instances were filed after the intervention of the Supreme Court.
A school in Dehradun was also targeted for organizing a cultural program on the Eid festival. Right-wing Hindu members harassed the school leadership, accusing it of devout conversions. Muslims do not run the school.
Apart from raising the issues of ‘Mazar Jihad’ and ‘Love Jihad’, Chief Minister Dhami also announced that the state will soon be the first to introduce a uniform civil code in the country for which a committee held public hearings in Dehradun last week.
The ruling BJP had set a record by returning to force in the mountainous state of Uttarakhand in the 2022 Assembly elections by shattering the myth of alternate force sharing every five years with the Congress party since the state’s formation. The party had won a decent victory by winning 47 seats, even though it was with its back to the wall due to strong opposition to ownership and default, resulting in the replacement of its 3 leading ministers in a matter of months last year before the Assembly elections.
It was not the functionality of the BJP government that brought them, but the very active communal crusade and the call of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who worked for the Saffron party.
Apart from the appeal of the BJP’s narrative of a physically powerful nationalism in an upper-caste-dominated and Hindu-dominated state of Uttarakhand, with gigantic numbers of military and ex-military personnel, the BJP’s virulent anti-Muslim communal crusade has helped them in the polls. The bigwigs of , in addition to the Union Prime Minister and the Minister of the Interior, finely supported the crusade of RSS state leaders, staff and officials.
In a state where almost every house has a young man serving in the armed forces, where the corpses of the jawans who give their lives to J
During the Assembly elections, the BJP doused it with a dose of threats from Muslims, including the Rohingya, to create “fear” within the majority community, as observed in Gujarat over the past two decades, where the party won elections in communal boards. The Congress party has been accused of appeasing Muslims in the election crusade that struck a chord. The same strategy is at play again.
Interestingly, this was a non-public purpose of Congress leader Harish Rawat, who, 3 months before the Assembly elections, said that his conflicting political parties had wrongly attacked him for favoring a specific network and that he had not allowed Friday “Jumma” prayers as he said that caused him to lose the 2017 Assembly elections and challenged his conflicting parties to show that such a government realizes the license for Muslim workers for the “Jumma” prayers on Friday the holy month of “Ramzan”. The ruling BJP, which had been on the defensive for its acts of omission and commissions over the past five years, latched on to the factor with the state and national BJP leaders calling it the “pro-Muslim” Congress party.
A remodeled photo of former Uttarakhand Chief Minister and Senior Congress Leader Harish Rawat shows him as Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, founder of Aligarh Muslim University, in the 2022 Assembly elections.
A virulent crusade presented through the ruling BJP and its “media friends” who oppose Rawat, former lead minister and chairman of the Congress crusade committee, for allegedly promising a “Muslim university” to a small Muslim Congress leader.
The word “Muslim” was enough for the BJP and Sangh Parivar to start their communal polarization game and target Congress and Rawat, who faces a ministerial leader.
A remodeled overlay photo of Rawat showing him as Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, founder of Aligarh Muslim University (AMU), released through the BJP’s computer cell, which was removed following an opinion by the election commission. As the election date approaches, the BJP’s more sensible leadership has gone further. They accused him of a congressional plot to inspire “earthly jihad” in the hills of Uttarakhand, regarded as ‘Devbhoomi’ (Land of the Gods). The BJP orchestrated the whole crusade very well on social media, penetrating villages far away from the hill.
At his election rallies, Union Home Minister Amit Shah accused Congress of settling Rohingya Muslims in the hills, raising concerns among the majority community.
During the election campaign for the 2022 Assembly, Prime Minister Modi subtly sent a very communal message outside his progress agenda. Without naming Muslims, he asked the audience if they knew what the Congress party would do to harm their culture, heritage, faith and religion. “Devbhoomi. ” He also asked them if they would prevent Congress from doing so.
Dhami provided the straw that broke the camel’s back and promised to put the UCC in effect in the state on the Goa lines.
Earlier, before the September 2021 Assembly elections, the Uttarakhand government had given the order to target the minority network for the factor of so-called “ground jihad. “”The order targets the Muslim network to create communal polarization.
The government order stated that there had been an “unprecedented” increase in population in parts of Uttarakhand through a safe community, leading to the migration of “members of a safe community. “
The state government ordered police and administrative officials in all districts to set up peace committees, monitor “illegal land transactions” and prepare a list of foreigners with criminal records. A government press release said: “Due to the unprecedented increase in population in some spaces of the state, the demographics of those spaces have been particularly affected. And because of this demographic shift, members of a certain network are forced to migrate from those spaces. Moreover, it is conceivable that the concord of the network in those spaces will possibly be disrupted. “
Interestingly, nothing came out of the district magistrates’ report, and no one raised it in the BJP’s narrative after the polls.
All after a BJP leader with close ties to the RSS, Ajendra Ajay, wrote to Dhami in July 2021, claiming that Muslims had introduced what he called “earthly jihad. “In his letter, he alleged that Muslims were not only buying land in bulk construction still worshipped and suggested to the CM to look into the problem.
Since the BJP came to the state after the Assembly elections in 2017, there have been nearly a dozen incidents in which the RSS, BJP and other right-wing teams have attacked members of the minority community. In July 2021, following the “Id-ul-Zuha” prayers of migrant Muslim staff at a structure site in Badrinath, right-wing teams demanded action. Rumours spread on social media that prayers were held at the Badrinath Temple to stoke communal tensions in the area. While various outlets were campaigning to blame Tablighi Jamaat members for the spread of COVID-19, Mahendra Bhatt, then BJP MP and leader of the Uttarakhand BJP, had now pleaded with Hindus to go to beauty salons and beauty salons owned by members of the minority community.
In April 2018, six department stores owned by Muslim investors were set on fire in the town of Augustmuni in the Rudraprayag district of Garhwal. Members of right-wing teams, adding those believed to belong to Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), organized a procession and attacked department stores following a rumour that a young Muslim man had raped an underage girl. The Rudraprayag district justice of the peace, in a statement, said it was a mere rumour spread on social media. In October 2017, Hindu teams attacked and looted department stores and Muslim homes from Rishikesh to Haridwar following a killing in Raiwala. The defendants in the murder case were Muslims.
On September 8, 2017, two Muslim children from Kirtinagar town in Tehri Garhwal were caught wandering with two women from the Hindu network at Dehradun police. Police temporarily reported the case to Kirtinagar, where members of far-right teams vandalized the apartment. shops owned by Muslim children. The children were sent to prison.
In July 2017, right-wing members attacked Muslim department stores in the town of Satpuli, Pauri Garhwal district, following an “offensive” Facebook post allegedly written through a Muslim child. Tension in the city of Satpuli, with ABVP members forcing the closure of the city’s market.
In July 2017, investors in Kashmir were attacked through some right-wing teams at Mussoorie hill station and given an ultimatum to pack their bags and leave Mussoorie until March 2018. The provocation to this was the alleged raising of pro-Pakistan slogans after an India-Pakistan Champions Trophy Match. Kashmiri investors, however, had nothing to do with it.
In addition to the local Muslims of Garhwali, who come from the districts of Nandprayag and Tehri Garhwal, some Muslims from the neighbouring districts of Uttar Pradesh have vegetable stalls, greengrocers, hairdressers and other small businesses. The local Muslims of Garhwali have lived in the hills for generations. The lowland districts of Dehradun, Haridwar and Udham Singh Nagar already have a giant Muslim population living in the spaces since the formation of Uttarakhand in 2000. The Muslim population represents about 10% of the total population of the state and is basically concentrated in the 3 neighborhoods
The Uttarakhand government did not provide concrete knowledge about the alleged demographic replacement cited in the ordinance. Nor did he specify the spaces where such “worrying” demographic adjustments have occurred, which have resulted in the migration of a “certain community. “No census was conducted after 2011.
On the other hand, the region has experienced emigration for many years due to complicated geographical terrain, lack of civic and fitness facilities, fewer educational and employment opportunities, etc. Former BJP Prime Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat even set up a Migration Commission to investigate the factor and recommend corrective measures. The Commission, headed by SS Negi, a retired IFS officer, presented its report to the BJP government. However, it did not mention any explanation as to why for coercion or forced migration due to the alleged demographic substitution cited in the order. Since the order was passed, district administrations have uncovered no instances of “ground jihad” in the state. After Gujarat, Uttarakhand is the next laboratory of the “Hindutva” agenda.
(He is a senior freelance journalist founded in Dehradun. He has worked with “The Indian Express” and “The Tribune” for more than 3 decades. Opinions are personal. )
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