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25-06-2022, 07:46 PM
Arundhati Roy
Published On 17 Jun 2022
Over the last few months, authorities in Indian states governed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have started bulldozing the homes, shops, and places of business that belong to Muslims merely suspected of participating in anti-government protests. The Chief Ministers of these states have proudly flaunted this policy in their election campaigns.
To my mind, this marks the moment when a deeply flawed, fragile democracy has transitioned – openly and brazenly – into a criminal, Hindu-fascist enterprise with tremendous popular support. We now appear to be ruled by gangsters fitted out as Hindu godmen. In their book, Muslims are public enemy number one.
In the past, Muslims have been punished with pogroms, lynchings, targeted murders, custodial killings, fake police “encounters” and imprisonment under false pretexts. Bulldozing their homes and businesses is only a new – and highly effective – weapon added to this list.
......
The bulldozing of properties ...... involves not just the police, but the municipal authorities, the media – who must be present to amplify and broadcast the spectacle of demon-slaying – and the courts who must look away and not intervene. It is meant to tell Muslims, “You are on your own. No help will come. You have no court of appeal. Every institution that used to be part of the checks and balances of this old democracy is now a weapon that can be used against you.”
......
In the two general elections of 2014 and 2019, the BJP has shown convincingly that it does not need the vote of India’s 200 million-strong Muslim population to win a majority in Parliament in the national elections. So, in effect, we are looking at a sort of disenfranchisement. That will have dangerous corollaries. Because once you are disenfranchised, you don’t matter. You become inconsequential. You can be used and abused. This is what we are witnessing now.
......
Today in India, we are living through the political equivalent of a scorched-earth policy. Everything – every institution that has taken years to build – is being destroyed. It is stupefying. A new generation of young people will grow up entirely brainwashed, with no connection to the history or the cultural complexity of their country. The regime – with the help of a media ...... keeps up a continuous drumbeat of bigotry and hatred, fuelled by hate-spewing stock characters on either side of the Hindu-Muslim divide.
......
On social media, it is now routine to encounter open calls for the genocide of Muslims. We have reached the point of no return. What those of us who stand against this, and especially the Muslim community in India, needs to think about is, how can we survive this? How can we resist it? These are hard questions to answer, because today in India even resistance itself, however peaceful, is considered a heinous crime almost akin to an act of terrorism.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/...enterprise
Published On 17 Jun 2022
Over the last few months, authorities in Indian states governed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have started bulldozing the homes, shops, and places of business that belong to Muslims merely suspected of participating in anti-government protests. The Chief Ministers of these states have proudly flaunted this policy in their election campaigns.
To my mind, this marks the moment when a deeply flawed, fragile democracy has transitioned – openly and brazenly – into a criminal, Hindu-fascist enterprise with tremendous popular support. We now appear to be ruled by gangsters fitted out as Hindu godmen. In their book, Muslims are public enemy number one.
In the past, Muslims have been punished with pogroms, lynchings, targeted murders, custodial killings, fake police “encounters” and imprisonment under false pretexts. Bulldozing their homes and businesses is only a new – and highly effective – weapon added to this list.
......
The bulldozing of properties ...... involves not just the police, but the municipal authorities, the media – who must be present to amplify and broadcast the spectacle of demon-slaying – and the courts who must look away and not intervene. It is meant to tell Muslims, “You are on your own. No help will come. You have no court of appeal. Every institution that used to be part of the checks and balances of this old democracy is now a weapon that can be used against you.”
......
In the two general elections of 2014 and 2019, the BJP has shown convincingly that it does not need the vote of India’s 200 million-strong Muslim population to win a majority in Parliament in the national elections. So, in effect, we are looking at a sort of disenfranchisement. That will have dangerous corollaries. Because once you are disenfranchised, you don’t matter. You become inconsequential. You can be used and abused. This is what we are witnessing now.
......
Today in India, we are living through the political equivalent of a scorched-earth policy. Everything – every institution that has taken years to build – is being destroyed. It is stupefying. A new generation of young people will grow up entirely brainwashed, with no connection to the history or the cultural complexity of their country. The regime – with the help of a media ...... keeps up a continuous drumbeat of bigotry and hatred, fuelled by hate-spewing stock characters on either side of the Hindu-Muslim divide.
......
On social media, it is now routine to encounter open calls for the genocide of Muslims. We have reached the point of no return. What those of us who stand against this, and especially the Muslim community in India, needs to think about is, how can we survive this? How can we resist it? These are hard questions to answer, because today in India even resistance itself, however peaceful, is considered a heinous crime almost akin to an act of terrorism.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/...enterprise
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