On 11th
June 2016, I read an article on IndiaTimes that said, and I quote:
Blaming the decrease in Hindu population in India on impotency of men, Vishwa
Hindu Parishad leader Pravin Togadia has urged Hindu men to “go home and
worship your manhood.” Addressing a gathering in Gujarat on Friday, he asked
Hindu couples to have more children to counter the growing number of Muslims in
India. Togadia also blamed “love jihad” and conversion to Christianity for
slipping percentage of Hindu population… He also questioned the Narendra Modi
government’s policies of development without offering protection to Hindus. The
VHP leader said, “You are making bullet trains, smart cities, but who will
travel in the trains if there is no Hindu?” On 20th July 2016, I read in The
Huffington Post: On Tuesday, members from the Punjab unit of the Shiv Sena
allegedly stopped trucks on their way to Jammu and Kashmir and forced the
Muslim drivers to chant ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’… Of the many things
ultranationalists have been attempting to enforce in India, the raising of the
‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ slogan, or even the willingness to raise it, is probably
seen by them as a definitive test of patriotism. In many instances, vigilante
groups have used the slogan, an ode to ‘Mother India’, to target and
marginalise minorities. The chant, however, was not used to inspire a sense of
brotherhood, quite the opposite. The report claimed that the same was done to
“pay back” Kashmiri Muslims for allegedly harassing Amarnath pilgrims.
According to the paper, some drivers were even beaten up for refusing to chant
the slogans. On 31st July, I read in Scroll.in: Dalits who were found with dead
cows or cow meat deserved to be beaten, BJP MLA from Hyderabad Raja Singh said
on Saturday. “Jo Dalit gaye ke maas ko le ja raha tha, jo uski pitai hui hai,
woh bohut hi achhi hui hai [Those Dalits who were taking the cow, the cow meat,
those who were beaten, it was a very good thing to happen],” Singh said in a
video uploaded on Facebook. Singh was referring to the incident in Una, Gujarat
last fortnight, where four Dalit men were assaulted by cow vigilante groups
when they were found skinning a dead cow….. He then asked if it is necessary to
kill cows, or eat their meat. “Yeh bahut galat hai [this is very wrong],” he
said. He claimed that because of such “galeez [filthy]” Dalits, others in the
community who are patriotic and religious are getting a bad name. Singh then
said he supports those who take it upon themselves to teach the Dalits “a
valuable lesson”. He also warned “every section of society, not just Dalits”,
that they will be taught a lesson in the same way should they kill cows. He also
told other gau rakshaks (cow protectors) that while the task ahead of them is
difficult, they must overcome them, and not stay silent “till the cow mother is
mother India”. On 1st August, I noticed in NDTV, the much respected defense
minister of our country saying, “One actor had said that his wife wants to live
out of India. It was an arrogant statement…” The report further noted: Mr
Parrikar alleged that the controversy around the actor’s comments saw people
withdraw from an e-commerce portal he endorsed – he did not name Snapdeal
either – and said the controversy cost Mr Khan the contract… “Such people who
speak against the country need to be taught a lesson by the people of this
country,” Mr Parrikar said, also talking about Delhi student leader Kanhaiya
Kumar of the Jawaharlal Nehru University. Do I need to say anything? I actually
think that these four quotes sum up what I want to say. Yet, on the beef issue,
let me explain something more sinister – the interesting case of the
Maharashtra beef ban. What has gone unreported or properly reported by media:
1. Possessing beef is not a crime (India is amongst the world’s largest beef
exporters, and many of the exporters are Hindus, who obviously possess the beef
for exporting) 2. Slaughtering cows is not a crime. (Jains own some of the
biggest slaughterhouses for exports) 3. Exporting beef is not a crime (Again
it’s the rich Jains/Hindus who are amongst the largest exporters) 4. Importing
beef is not a crime (It comes from Goa, where the population is non Muslim) So
what is a crime? Selling beef internally within the state. Who suffers? The
individual poor slaughterhouse owners and employees who used to sell locally.
Who are they? About 500,000 Muslims. They lose their daily livelihood. Whose
staple diet was beef? Muslims and equally importantly Dalits. (Go to any place
where beef is available in Delhi, you will observe it’s packed even during
Ramadan… so who is eating? The Dalits whose primary source of protein is
beef).
In fact, as per the latest NSSO census quoted by a July
2016 Live Mint report, 7% of Hindu beef eaters
are upper caste Hindus ; amongst the remaining Hindu beef eaters, “more
than 70% of the beef-eating population is SC/ST, 21% is other backward castes”
quotes the news report. So there are interesting laws coming out in this land
where selling a cow for slaughter has been a key source of earning for none
other than Hindus, given that the moment the cow stops giving milk, every Hindu
sells it off knowing fully well that it’s going to be slaughtered for beef. But
today, thanks to the new rule that is trying to ban not just the slaughter of
those cows which give milk, but as they say gauvansh or some such thing like that
which means you can’t slaughter the bull, the male calf and even the cow that
has stopped giving milk, what we have are thousands of cows being left in the
vast lands of Bundelkhand to die, because no one wants to own or feed them
anymore. So much for Gau
Mata. In effect, today, the Dalits’ and Muslims’ main source of
protein is in scarcity, while the cows die as they can’t be slaughtered. And
the price of beef is now at Rs 140, almost the same as that of chicken… In
fact, given this, I wonder what was Raja Singh and Shri Togadia’s fear? There
is no fear anymore for Hindus… We will starve the Muslims and ‘Filthy’ Dalits
dead if necessary and throw them off their livelihoods. Am sure everyone knows
that I have no love for religion and hate the very existence of religion and
the concept of this imaginary Pokemon called God. I am no Muslim sympathizer.
Nor a Hindu hater. I just feel for those being marginalized. I have been one of
those, who, at the cost of being labeled as sold out to Modi, had totally
supported his bid for the nation’s leadership and even seriously considered an
invitation to join the party; besides writing tens of articles in The Sunday Indian as well as in other national
dailies supporting his candidature. Why? Because I thought that finally, we have
a leader who can speak. Despite my being an anti-theist, I thought, so what if
he is from a Hindu party; he has the courage to say “toilets before temples”!
He can speak. He can lead. Dear Sir, people in your party and its support group
are hell bent on forcing us to go to the toilets you wanted to be built. Not
for the reasons you wanted, but to go there to worship our own linga… apart from
additionally worshipping the Shiv
linga in the
temples. So that we can counter the Muslim threat to this great nation. They
are hell bent on proving your toilets before temples slogan right. Only in a
wrong sense. They want us to say Bharat
Mata Ki Jai to
prove our patriotism. They are using beef to hunt down Muslims and Dalits. If
you say India is becoming intolerant, they want to teach us a lesson.
Therefore, I don’t have the courage to put any conclusion to my article. I am
just waiting to hear your man
ki baat… to know what you want and what you conjure of it all. I am
waiting for a roaring speech that sets them all right. Unless this is what you
really wanted to happen in the country.
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