Indian Muslims need to unite under a single banner
International organisations like Genocide Watch and UN-affiliated bodies have issued significant warnings, asserting that parts of the Indian state are in an advanced process of genocide against its religious minority communities, especially Muslims. Genocide Watch has declared a 'Genocide Emergency' in India, assessing that the country has already crossed eight out of ten stages in its warning framework.
Dr Stanton, who predicted the Rwandan genocide, has repeatedly warned that "genocide may well happen in India" unless the international community confronts the ruling Hindutva ideology. He has drawn parallels between the situation in India and the genocidal campaigns against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.
In Modi's India the oppression of 250 million Muslims is taking place as part of a structural programme. The RSS operating through its death squads and political wings is the platform of nourishing Muslim hate; the state under BJP is the executioner; the bureaucracy, including the judiciary, is the tool; and the financing is being done by corporate India. The masses are led by Hindutva gangs through so-called street justice and the majority of Hindus have either become silent spectators or zealot bhakts, who celebrate this oppression.
Mira Kamdar had done an incisive analysis of the horrific 2002 Gujarat Massacre. She had highlighted that the perpetrators included large numbers of educated, middle-class individuals, doctors, engineers and businessmen and that middle-class women openly cheered on the attackers. Hindu extremism has become a mainstream phenomenon in India, no longer confined to the fringes of society.
Fast forward to twenties, during President Trump's visit to India in 2020, Mira Kamdar penned an article in The Atlantic. She had described the events in Delhi as a pogrom. At the very moment, Trump sat down for a meal with Modi, Hindus in the same city were beating and shooting Muslims.
Mira Kamdar believes that the Delhi police, who answer directly to Amit Shah, either passively watched the violence or actively assisted the mobs. Social media showed videos of officers breaking surveillance cameras and mocking injured, bleeding Muslim men lying on the ground, and filming them with their own phones. The attacks recalled the 2002 Gujarat riots, when Modi served as chief minister and authorities failed to intervene in bloodshed that claimed around 2,000 lives, most of them Muslim.
More recently one can witness the connivance of Indian Judiciary in this state oppression. The Madhya Pradesh High Court has ruled that the disputed 11th century Kamal Maula Mosque in Dhar is a Hindu temple dedicated to the goddess Saraswati. The court annulled a 2003 order by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) that had allowed Muslims to offer namaz at the site every Friday. The court suggested that the Muslim community could approach the state government for the allocation of separate land in Dhar district to build a mosque.
Heard of it before? Yes, it's a similar verdict as that of Babri Mosque.
On the streets, especially the ones ruled by BJP, Hindutva mobs are openly marauding the shops, businesses and communities belonging to Muslims. In bureaucracy as well as corporate sector, being a Muslim is an invitation for terror. If you are a Muslim officer, you will be blackmailed by your subordinates on flimsy charges through fake evidence. Recently, Bajrang Dal attacked a private company store in Dehradun and terrorised the Muslim manager for a complaint by his subordinate. He was coerced, humiliated and called a jihadi. Even poor Muslims with small businesses and chicken shops are being harassed by Hindutva mobs by asking for licences and rule books – something which fall within the government purview.
Why have the bureaucracy and judiciary become silent participants in Muslim oppression and pogroms? This is a million-dollar question. This has its origins in what happened in Gujarat. According to a BBC report from 2011, senior police officer such as Sanjiv Bhatt publicly declared in the Supreme Court that Modi gave the go-ahead to commence the Gujarat Massacre in 2002. Sanjiv Bhatt allegedly attended a conference where Mr Modi stated that Hindus should be allowed to express their rage. He further said that during a meeting the night before the riots, Mr Modi instructed officials that the Muslim community needed to be taught a lesson after an attack on a train carrying Hindu pilgrims. Today Sanjiv Bhatt languishes in jail for telling the truth.
While Muslims in India have suffered due to the issues outlined above, there is a need to examine the position of Sarkari Mussalmans. Such Mussalman of India is a brand of apologetic leaders that includes Abdullahs and Muftis from Occupied Kashmir, Owaisies from Hyderabad, and some religious personalities affiliated with Jamiat Ulama-e-Hind. They have always favoured the concept of secular India and would go to great lengths to criticise Pakistan and persuade people that Muslims in India should undergo all injustice and misery in order to placate the majority. These politicians have made fortunes, and their second and third generations are poised to continue parroting this foolish logic of appeasement.
Muslims in India should understand that neither Sarkari Mussalmans nor secular Indians, nor the law enforcement or court, can provide them with any relief. They have the right to defend their home, life, property and honour under international and local law, and they should not apologise for doing so. They need unity and resolve to form a united front and live fearlessly. While community defence, mohallah defence and city defence are necessary, Muslims in India must unite under a single banner. They should reject Sarkari Mussalmans in political and religious authority because it is their lack of vision and avarice that is causing the ordinary Indian Muslims to suffer today.
The slow-motion demise of India's 250 million Muslim community cannot continue. There is need for them to follow the ideology of the Tiger of Mysore, Tipu Sultan, as it may be their final chance to rescue their life, property, dignity and honour.