India has witnessed a spurt in communal violence incidents during the Rama Navami celebration.And all these incidents clearly show a pattern behind it.Non-BJP ruled states like West Bengal, Bihar and Jharkhand bore the maximum brunt of this latest violence perpetrated allegedly by the Hindutva groups.
In Bihar’s Sasaram and Bihar Sharif towns, riots broke out.Hindutva radicals set fire to a mosque and a madrasa in Bihar Sharif of Nalanda district. A 110-year-old madrasa in the town was allegedly vandalised and destroyed by a mob of over 1,000 people on April 1.
Violence between two groups broke out after a Ram Navami procession moved through an area with a “sizeable Muslim population” in the town of Bihar Sharif, according to Nalanda Police.
The fire completely destroyed the madrasa, which included more than 4,500 books and manuscripts.
“There were about 4,500 books on our 18 shelves. Opening year of this madrasa was 1924. We received a large number of books from the Bihar Madrasa Education Board in 1930,” statedthe madrasa principal, Mohammed Shakir Qasmi, adding that the books were kept in cabinets.
The Hindutva procession first passed past the mosque calmly, according to the imam, who was speaking to the media. “There is no Muslim community in the area around the mosque, which is situated at a bend. The Hindutva crowd stormed the mosque after discovering its isolation,” the Imam said. In relation to the incident, 77 persons have been detained by police.
While Sasaram town of Rohtas district reported a second explosion two days after another explosion there had left six persons injured.
In neighbouring Jharkhand’s Shastrinagar of Jamshedpur the situation was tense after sloganeering and stone pelting between two communities. Senior BJP leader Abhay Singh has been arrested by the Jharkhand Police on charges of conspiring riots. SP City Vijay Shankar said that ‘Abhay Singh had instigated people from behind’.
In West Bengal’s Howrah district, there was violence engineered during the Ram Navami procession. In Howrah’s Kazipara neighbourhood, a number of vehicles were set on fire. The area was sealed off by a heavy police presence, and the tension persisted. Several vehicles could be seen on fire in video footage from the area affected by the incident.
Thousands of people participated in those processions at Howrah, Kharagpur, Barrackpore, Bhadreswar, Siliguri, and Asansol while chanting “Jai Shri Ram” slogans which has now turned into a war cry by the Hindutva groups.
A young man was arrested by West Bengal police for waving a rifle during a procession on Ram Navami in Shibpur from Bihar. He was purportedly discovered to be a BJP local unit member. Mamata Banerjee, the chief minister of West Bengal, urged Amit Shah to keep his word and restrain the suspected party member. The Home Minister has not yet responded as he roared and warned at a rally in Bihar that if his party was elected in the next election, he will hang the rioters upside down and correct them.
Mamata Banerjee said the Bharatiya Janata Party, along with other right-wing organisations, was allegedly behind the violence that occurred on Ram Navami in Howrah.
The violence in Howrah was not committed by either Muslims or Hindus. Banerjee stated to Bengali television news channel ABP Ananda that the BJP, Bajrang Dal, and other such organisations were all involved in the violence with weapons.
BJP-RULED STATES ALSO WITNESS VIOLENCE
Stones were thrown during two marches in Vadodara, Gujarat, as well. In Delhi, many people disobeyed a police order and staged a procession in Jahangirpuri, which had experienced disturbances during Hanuman Jayanti celebrations last year.
In Aurangabad, Maharashtra, following a confrontation between two groups near a Ram temple, a crowd of about 500 people went berserk and threw stones and bottles filled with petrol, injuring at least 12 people, including 10 police officers, according to officials.
Large cut-outs of Ram, drumbeats, and saffron banners were all major elements of these processions. Swords and trishulas were carried by some of the procession participants.
Violence was seen throughout the country on the occasion of Rama Navami the year before as well.
Jharkhand had communal unrest in Lohardaga, Koderma, and Bokaro. Khambhat and Himmatnagar in Gujarat, Khargone and Khandwa in Madhya Pradesh, JNU and Jahangirpuri in Delhi, Karauli in Rajasthan, Malad and Amaravati in Maharashtra, Mormugao in Goa, and Howrah and Bankura in West Bengal all saw a breakdown in communal peace and harmony.
Besides Rama Navami related violence, there were several incidents of attacks on Muslims reported.In Sandal Kalan village, Sonipat district, Haryana, a group of 15 to 20 armed men attacked worshippers inside a mosque and ransacked the building. In the attack, at least nine persons suffered injuries.
Following the event, images of the armed men’s assault have gone viral. The assailants were seen walking freely holding sticks.
It’s unclear why the provocation was made. However, the police have filed an FIR against 19 persons.
In Jharkhand, two Muslim youngsters were killed allegedly in Police custody. They were 25 and 21, respectively. One has been accused of stealing, while the other is a sand smuggler.
Even though above-mentioned violent incidents are new, they seem to follow a set pattern. Are they merely coincidental incidents, or are they part of a wider plot to divide the people in the name of Ram on his birthday?
Dev Nandan, a former RSS member, in his book (Main Sangh se kiyunjuda? kiyunalaghua?) underlines that RSS people first experienced religious procession in 1923 in Nagpur to foment communal violence in order to create insecurity among the Hindu society.After this success, the Hindu festivals have been used as a “potent weapon” to incite communal disturbances in the country.
In this connection, Citizens And Lawyers Initiatives, a rights group,prepared a report titled as, “Routes of Wrath, Weaponizing Religious Processions”, the report made after reviewing the communal riots data provides a glimpse of the pervasive conspiracy and carefully thought-out scheme to poison this secular country’s majority people.
According to the report, these incidents of communal violence have a common template and modus-operandi.Attacks on Muslim-owned property and establishments, mosques, and other places of worship has become a hallmark of religious processions purportedly commemorating Rama Navami and Hanuman Jayanti.
“All such processions comprised of larger-than-usual gatherings of saffron-clad men drawing swords, waving trishuls and even (in some cases) firearms, taking deliberately mapped paths that crossed major mosques and Muslim-dominated neighbourhoods, and raising provocative slogans about the coming of a Hindu Rashtra, the conditions under which Muslims would be allowed to live in this nation, and even justifying violence against Muslims. Many of these processions were accompanied by large flatbed trucks with concert-sized, high-decibel amplifiers and mega-speakers, on which DJs blasted hate-filled anti-Muslim music,” read the report.
It also highlights how Hindu religious processions have started to use the inflammatory, incendiary, and anti-Islamic “Hindutva pop” music in recent years.
RISE IN COMMUNAL VIOLENCE AFTER BJP CAME TO POWER
BBC reported that the communally motivated incidents and hate speech instances increased by leaps and bounds since the BJP took over in 2014. One must understand that communal riots and public discord affect social harmony and the financial and economic prospects of the state.
Even the Union government has admitted in the Parliament that over 2,900 communal violence cases have been registered in the country in the last 5 years.
Citing National Crime Records Bureau data, Union Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai said a total of 378 cases of communal or religious rioting were registered in 2021, 857 in 2020, 438 in 2019, 512 in 2018 and 723 in 2017.
WHY IS RAM BEING USED FOR A POLITICAL END?
Another intriguing point is the RSS-BJP’s plan to make Ram the centre of the entire Hindu pantheon. The fact is that he is not extensively venerated throughout the whole country, and not all of the states have many temples dedicated to him. The states that venerate the goddesses Kali and Durga are West Bengal and Bihar. The southern states, let alone the northeast, do not have many Ram temples.
Rama Navami and Hanuman Jayanti processions have just recently begun to be observed by West Bengal people.
The purpose is obvious, the plan is clear, and the template is widely used.
In this regard, Chhattisgarh Christian Forum president Dr. Arun Pannalal pointed out that all flags and buntings during the Rama Navami processions throughout the country were of identical size and colour and obviously supplied by one centralised setup.Speaking with Radiance,Dr Pannalal said he took a close look and delved deep that all flags having the face of Hanuman were of identical nature.
“The saffron sarees and kurtapyjama sets were available in cloth shops at subsidised rates. The shop owner quoted me 240/- for a saree. Same Rs.240/- was quoted for the kurta pyjama set…amazing isn’t it?”
Of course, the country witnessed a lot of violence, religious polarisation, fanatics on the loose.
However, the sad part is that Opposition political parties have become passive supporters of this violence.They rarely issued any statement(s) condemning the violence in the name of religion.
It is to be noted that Opposition parties have state governments in at least five states, the police is a state subject, yet violence took place. Why?Dr Pannalal posed this question to them. “What is Bengal crying about? The stark fact is no one wants to disturb the Hindutva bogey, or in effect they passively consent to the idea of a “hindu- rashtra”. They want to eat the cake and have it too…! he underlined.
For example, Lalu Prasad Yadav, the vociferous leader of the Rashtriya Janata Dal, has reportedly kept completely silent about the communal unrest in Bihar for the first time in more than three decades. Lalu has never before kept quiet about communal tensions in the state or elsewhere in the country.
The state’s chief minister, Nitish Kumar, has asserted time and again that the communal violence was a result of a plot to upend peace in the state.
Taking the strong notice of recent violence, Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, the largest socio and religious organisation of Indian Muslims said it is a matter of grave concern that the pattern of violence in various cities of India followed a similar and familiar pattern. JIH vice President Engineer Mohammad Salim said any act of violence carried out while masquerading as a religious procession is extremely disturbing for any religion. Religious celebrations and processions are intended to promote harmony and brotherhood throughout the community. It is strongly condemned and ought to stop if it is used as a tool for carrying out violence or disrupting the peace in a country.