The Davangere South trigger

The ongoing Davangere South by-election has crystallised these long-simmering grievances. The Congress decision to field Samarth Mallikarjun, heir to the Shamanur political family, instead of a Muslim candidate in a constituency with around 75,000–80,000 Muslim voters out of roughly 2.3 lakh has sparked visible anger and protest on the ground. Reports of community leaders and youth expressing resentment, coupled with calls for a Muslim candidate, have put the national party on the defensive. Senior Muslim functionaries have privately and publicly acknowledged disquiet over a pattern where Muslim votes are treated as guaranteed, but Muslim claims to candidature are treated as negotiable.

The Davangere episode is not an isolated misstep. For many Muslim leaders, it is merely the latest entry in a long ledger of slights, broken expectations, and what feels like deliberate undercutting of community leadership within the Congress.

The 2012 MLC election: a warning sign

The 2012 MLC election in Karnataka, when the BJP was in power and Congress sat in opposition, is remembered by many as an early warning. The party had to pick three candidates from the Assembly to the Legislative Council: C Motamma, an established woman leader; MR Seetharam; and Iqbal Ahmed Saradgi, a senior Muslim leader from Kalaburagi.

At this point, Opposition Leader Siddaramaiah is said to have demanded the Council seat for his close associate CM Ibrahim. When the party declined, Byrathi Suresh rebelled and contested the MLC election as an independent. The rebellion shook the party internally and created an atmosphere of uncertainty. In the end, Motamma and Seetharam won with 19 votes each, while Saradgi lost, and Byrathi Suresh emerged victorious with a significantly higher margin than any other candidate.

For many Muslim observers, the incident left two bitter impressions. First, that the factional tussle triggered around CM Ibrahim effectively jeopardised the lone Muslim candidate’s prospects. Second, that the party’s “damage control” later – including action against Suresh that quietly faded away – suggested that ensuring a Muslim win was never the system’s first priority. Within the community, it is now recalled as an early blow that foreshadowed how internal Congress power games could repeatedly come at the expense of Muslim representation.

Hebbal 2016: the CK Jaffer Sharief legacy sidelined

The 2016 Hebbal Assembly by-election is another case that fuels the current sense of grievance. The seat fell vacant after the death of BJP MLA Jagadish Kumar. In 2013, Congress’ CK Abdul Rehman Sharif – grandson of veteran leader and former Union Railway Minister CK Jaffer Sharief, a man credited with significant railway reforms and influence at the national level – had lost the seat by a relatively narrow margin of around 5,000 votes.

Given his political lineage, prior performance, and the constituency’s demographics, local Congress workers and observers believed Rehman Sharif was positioned to win the by poll if given a second chance. Instead, the contest saw accusations of internal manipulation and factional interference, with senior leaders and power brokers allegedly working in ways that undercut his campaign. The result was a decisive defeat – he reportedly lost by over 20,000 votes – and, in the subsequent 2018 election, the ticket went to Byrathi Suresh, who won and continues as MLA and now minister from Hebbal.

For many Muslims aligned with the Congress, Hebbal embodies a recurring pattern: Muslim candidates are projected as winnable only up to the point that they remain subordinate to entrenched caste and money networks. When their independent stature grows, or when they begin to look like serious power centres in their own right, they find themselves replaced or undermined.

Mysuru, Tanveer Sait, and the coalition years

The 2018 Congress–JD(S) coalition and the Mysuru city corporation elections brought another example into focus. Tanveer Sait, a long-time Muslim leader from Mysuru and son of heavyweight Azeez Sait, had been a minister in the previous government. However, local pressures and his tactical proximity to JD(S) leaders reportedly put him at odds with Siddaramaiah and sections of the Congress high command.

Though Tanveer Sait went on to win the 2023 Assembly election, he was denied a cabinet berth and instead accommodated only as a working president of the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee. For a leader with ministerial experience and a strong local base, this demotion is seen within the community as another case where the party’s internal calculations trumped recognition of a Muslim leader’s stature and seniority.

Roshan Baig: reformer to outcast

If there is one episode that symbolises the cost of dissent for Muslim leaders in the Congress, it is the ouster of Roshan Baig. A veteran leader and the only Muslim to have held the Home portfolio in Karnataka, Baig is widely credited with important police reforms and with establishing the Hajj Bhavan in Bengaluru, which has become a model for similar facilities elsewhere.

In 2019, following the Congress’ dismal Lok Sabha performance, winning only one seat from Karnataka – Baig publicly criticised Siddaramaiah, then AICC general secretary KC Venugopal, and state leadership for their handling of the elections. His outburst was followed by swift disciplinary action, culminating in his suspension and political isolation.

For many in the Muslim community, the message was clear: decades of loyalty and policy contributions did not protect Baig once he took on the central leadership. The party’s willingness to discard a senior Muslim face over internal criticism reinforced the perception that Muslim leaders are tolerated only so long as they remain unquestioningly loyal.

CM Ibrahim: a national figure walks away

The trajectory of CM Ibrahim adds a national dimension to this story. A stalwart who held key Union portfolios like Civil Aviation, Tourism, and Information & Broadcasting in the Deve Gowda and Gujral governments, Ibrahim has occupied prominent positions in both the Congress and JD(S). Over the years, however, his relationship with the Congress leadership—especially Siddaramaiah—deteriorated, and he eventually walked away from the party’s fold.

For grassroots Muslim cadres, Ibrahim’s estrangement is often cited as proof that even the tallest Muslim leaders are dispensable when their interests collide with dominant caste factions or leadership ambitions inside the Congress.

Lok Sabha numbers: the structural deficit

Beyond individual stories, the structural underrepresentation of Muslims in Karnataka’s parliamentary politics is stark. For a state with around 12–13% Muslim population, Karnataka has sent only one Muslim MP to the Lok Sabha in the last 20 years – Iqbal Ahmed Saradgi from Gulbarga in 2004 and Mansoor Ali Khan in 2024.

Data from recent elections shows that the Congress, BJP and JD(S) together have fielded only 11 Muslim candidates across four Lok Sabha polls between 2004 and 2019 – less than 10% of the 112 candidates the three parties collectively put up in that period. In 2004, there were four Muslim candidates from major parties; in 2009 and 2014, there were three each; by 2019 and 2024, that number dropped to just one. None of these candidates belonged to the BJP.

Political scientists and community leaders point to multiple reasons: the lack of clearly decisive Muslim “vote bank” parliamentary constituencies; the refusal of parties to groom Muslim leaders beyond community silos; and the rise of majoritarian polarisation as a deliberate electoral strategy. Delimitation in 2008, they argue, also reshaped constituencies in ways that further reduced the perceived winnability of Muslim candidates.

The case of Mansoor Ali Khan in Bengaluru Central, who recently lost by around 30,000 votes, is often read through this lens. From the community’s perspective, the issue is not just his defeat, but the sense that Kuruba, Lingayat and other caste blocs—who have long benefited from Muslim support in their own constituencies—did not mobilise with the same intensity for a Muslim candidate when it was their turn to reciprocate

Assembly level signals: Gangavati and beyond

The 2023 Assembly election in Gangavati added another layer to this community alienation. Iqbal Ansari, the Congress candidate, lost by 7,000–8,000 votes. Local accounts attribute the defeat not to lack of appeal but to internal sabotage: Lingayat and Kuruba factions, allegedly shaped by senior local leaders, were unwilling to back Ansari fully because his victory might have strengthened his claim for a cabinet berth in the future.

Similar stories are whispered from other constituencies where Muslims form a decisive part of the Congress vote base but remain underrepresented in ticket distribution and cabinet appointments. At the same time, Muslim voters have consistently rallied behind non-Muslim Congress candidates, from Bidar and Kalaburagi to Raichur, Koppal and Ballari—often playing a critical role in their victories.

A politics built on asymmetry

Taken together, these episodes and numbers suggest a deep asymmetry at the heart of Congress–Muslim relations in Karnataka. On one side stands a community that has repeatedly voted for the Congress to keep the BJP at bay and to defend secular space. On the other stands a party that has been increasingly cautious, even reluctant – about translating that loyalty into proportionate representation.

Davangere South has therefore become more than a by poll. It is a symbol. For many Muslims, it confirms a pattern: when there is a clash between dynastic claims, dominant caste interests, and Muslim representation, the latter is almost always the first to be sacrificed.

Conclusion: A Lesser Evil

The central grievance emerging from Karnataka’s Muslim electorate is not that the Congress has never fielded Muslim candidates, nor that it has never elevated Muslim leaders. The grievance is that these gestures have become rarer, more conditional, and more vulnerable to internal sabotage, even as the community continues to vote for the party in large numbers.

In an era where majoritarian politics is openly dismissive of Muslim concerns, the Congress still benefits from being seen as the lesser evil. But “lesser evil” is not a sustainable political identity. For a party that speaks the language of diversity and inclusion, Karnataka’s record on Muslim representation – particularly in Parliament – stands as an uncomfortable indictment.

Unless the Congress begins to treat Muslim representation not as a risk but as a rightful outcome of long-term loyalty, the disconnect between its rhetoric and its ticket distribution will only widen. Davangere South is a test, but it is also a mirror. The question facing the party is simple: will it continue to rely on fear of the BJP to hold Muslim voters, or will it finally acknowledge and repay a political debt that has been accumulating for decades?

(The author is Editor in chief, NewsHamster (NH), a portal that majorly covers Bengaluru and Karnataka related stories.)

Related:

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In line with the approaching Karnataka polls, BJP MLA KS Eshwarappa gives anti-Muslim speech

Supreme Court takes action amid outrage following Karnataka Judge’s anti-Muslim and gender-insensitive comments in court

The post Congress and Karnataka’s Muslims: Loyalty without Representation appeared first on SabrangIndia.

These are not isolated disruptions. When read alongside official data placed before the Odisha Legislative Assembly in March 2026—where Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi acknowledged 54 communal riots and 7 mob lynching incidents since June 2024—and a recent audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India exposing the exclusion of over 160,000 Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) members from welfare schemes, a more systemic pattern begins to emerge.

Across districts and contexts, the incidents point to a convergence of communal polarisation, administrative inaction, coercive responses to dissent, and gaps in welfare delivery.

Church Vandalism in Keonjhar: Crime, silence, and communal retaliation

On April 6, 2026, a church in Murgagoth village under Anandpur police station in Keonjhar district was vandalised by a mob, as reported by The Hindu. The attack was triggered by allegations that a visually impaired minor girl had become pregnant after being sexually assaulted months earlier by a man from the same village—identified as her distant uncle.

Police officials confirmed that the alleged assault had not been reported prior to the incident. It was only when villagers recently became aware of the pregnancy that tensions escalated. In the early hours of April 6, when the church was unoccupied, a group of miscreants removed furniture, including chairs and an almirah, and set them on fire.

The accused was reportedly working in Tamil Nadu at the time. The delay in reporting the alleged sexual assault raises serious concerns about access to justice, barriers to reporting, and the vulnerability of the victim, particularly given her visual impairment. At the same time, the targeting of a place of worship reflects how criminal allegations were swiftly reframed through a communal lens.

The village itself, consisting of around 85 households, is almost evenly divided between Hindu and Christian residents. Police described the area as communally sensitive and deployed forces to prevent escalation. A complaint has now been filed regarding the alleged rape, but the sequence of events underscores a troubling dynamic—where due process is bypassed, and collective punishment is enacted before legal accountability is even initiated.

A State Under Strain: Rising communal violence and incomplete accountability

The Keonjhar incident is not an aberration. Data shared by Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi in the Odisha Legislative Assembly in March 2026 indicates that 54 communal riots and 7 mob lynching incidents have been recorded in the state between June 2024 and February 2026, according to Hindustan Times.

Nearly 300 individuals were arrested in connection with communal riots, and 61 people in lynching cases. However, the fact that chargesheets were filed in less than 50% of riot cases raises concerns about the effectiveness of investigations and the likelihood of convictions.

District-level data reveals concentrations of violence:

• Balasore: 24 riot cases
• Khurda (including Bhubaneswar): 16 cases
• Additional incidents in Koraput, Malkangiri, and Bhadrak

A government White Paper further recorded 122 communal incidents in 2025, including 16 involving Hindu-Christian tensions.

Yet, significant incidents appear underrepresented in official accounts. The October 2025 communal violence in Cuttack, which led to a three-day curfew following clashes during Durga Puja immersion, was not explicitly acknowledged in the Chief Minister’s reply. The violence reportedly escalated into arson and clashes involving members of right-wing organisations.

Over the past 20 months, multiple towns have experienced curfews, internet shutdowns, and mob violence, including incidents targeting Bengali-speaking Muslims. Officials have conceded that some cases may go unreported, particularly when victims are daily-wage earners reluctant to approach the police.

While the state has pointed to measures such as peace committees and strengthened intelligence gathering, the persistence of incidents and gaps in prosecution suggest a deeper issue of accountability and deterrence.

Rayagada Erupts: Tribal resistance, mining, and militarised policing

Tensions over land, resources, and consent erupted violently in Rayagada district in April 2026, where clashes broke out between tribal communities and security forces over a road construction project linked to the proposed Sijimali bauxite mine, as reported by Hindustan Times.

At least 70 people were injured, including 58 security personnel, after villagers allegedly resisted police with stones, axes, and other weapons. Police responded with tear gas, and prohibitory orders were imposed in the area.

The confrontation occurred in the context of long-standing opposition to the mining project led by Vedanta Limited, which secured rights to the Sijimali reserve in 2023. The project spans approximately 1,500 hectares, including over 700 hectares of forestland, and is expected to produce 9 million tonnes of bauxite annually.

For local tribal communities, however, the issue is existential. Residents have consistently argued that the project threatens their forests, water sources, livelihoods, and sacred landscapes. Central to the dispute is the requirement under the Forest Rights Act, 2006 that Gram Sabha consent must be obtained before forestland diversion.

Authorities have claimed that such consent was secured in 2023. However, multiple villages have since passed resolutions denying that these Gram Sabha meetings ever took place, alleging that approvals were fabricated.

The situation has been further aggravated by allegations of heavy-handed policing. Civil society groups and local organisations have reported:

• Night raids in villages
• Mass detentions, including women
• Use of tear gas and force in residential areas
• Deployment of drones and armed patrols restricting daily life

An open letter by the “Concerned Citizens Forum” described the police response as “barbaric” and called for withdrawal of forces, release of detained individuals, and cancellation of the mining project.

#Vedanta_Go_Back …..
Tribal people of Rayagada district #Odisha hv taken an oath to fight against corporate loot. pic.twitter.com/j0UJcTHSoB

— Amiya_Pandav ଅମିୟ ପାଣ୍ଡଵ Write n Fight (@AmiyaPandav) April 8, 2026

The clash is thus not merely a law-and-order issue, but part of a prolonged conflict over development, legality, and tribal autonomy.

Exclusion by design? CAG flags systemic welfare failures

Parallel to these conflicts, a structural crisis in governance emerges from the findings of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India. In an audit conducted between July 2024 and January 2025, the CAG found that 54% of Odisha’s PVTG population—around 160,000 people—remained excluded from welfare schemes.

Despite the Odisha PVTG Empowerment and Livelihood Improvement Programme (OPELIP), only 134,000 out of 294,000 individuals were covered as of March 2024. The exclusion was particularly stark in 1,138 newly identified villages, which were not integrated into the programme even years after recognition.

Key findings include:

• Three Micro Project Agencies (MPAs) created in 2020 remain non-functional, lacking both staff and funding
• Entire communities, such as the Birhor tribe (341 individuals), remain completely excluded
• ₹20.20 crore in funds remained unspent for over three years
• Basic data on infrastructure and services in tribal areas is missing or unavailable

The audit also flagged serious shortcomings in the Late Marriage Incentive Scheme, which reached only 58% of its target beneficiaries and covered just 43% of villages.

These findings reveal not just administrative inefficiency, but a pattern of systemic neglect, where even targeted interventions fail to reach the most vulnerable populations.

The complete CAG report may be viewed below:

Law, Power, and Impunity: MLA firing incident in Balangir

Questions of accountability were further sharpened by an incident in Balangir district in April 2026, where BJP MLA Naveen Jain was booked for allegedly firing blank rounds during a Ram Navami procession.

The firing, which took place in a crowded public setting, caused panic among attendees. Police registered a case under provisions of the Arms Act and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, seized the weapon, and suspended the MLA’s Personal Security Officer.

Despite video evidence, the MLA claimed the weapon was a toy gun—a claim contradicted by police findings. Opposition leaders have argued that the incident reflects a broader pattern of political impunity, particularly given allegations of prior misconduct.

Conclusion

Taken together, the events across Odisha reveal a pattern that cannot be dismissed as episodic unrest. The Keonjhar church vandalism underscores how quickly allegations—particularly involving vulnerable victims—can be communalised in the absence of timely legal intervention. The Rayagada clashes expose the deep faultlines between state-led development and tribal rights, where questions of consent under the Forest Rights Act, 2006 remain unresolved and contested on the ground. The CAG’s findings on PVTG exclusion highlight a parallel reality of administrative neglect, where even designated welfare mechanisms fail to reach those most in need. Meanwhile, incidents like the Balangir firing case involving a sitting MLA raise troubling concerns about accountability and the uneven application of the law.

What binds these developments is not merely their occurrence within a short timeframe, but the institutional responses that follow—or fail to follow. Delayed complaints, incomplete investigations, underutilised funds, disputed consent processes, and selective enforcement together point to a governance framework struggling to maintain both legitimacy and trust.

In this context, the question is no longer limited to law and order. It is about whether state institutions can uphold due process, protect vulnerable communities, and mediate conflict without deepening it. The trajectory suggested by these incidents indicates that without structural course correction, Odisha risks moving further towards a landscape marked by normalised violence, contested authority, and systemic exclusion.

Related:

An Adivasi woman once in bonded labour now serves her village as a Sarpanch

Odisha: 18 months, 54 incidents of communal hate crimes, 7 mob lynchings

Odisha: Man forced to chant religious slogan, lynched by cow vigilantes

Publicly Tortured, Forced to Eat Cow Dung: No arrests in Odisha Pastor assault case

MP, Odisha, Delhi, Rajasthan: Right-wing outfits barge into 2 churches ahead of Christmas, attack vendors selling X’mas goodies, tensions run high

The post Fractured Fault lines: Violence, governance gaps, and rising tensions across Odisha appeared first on SabrangIndia.

High-Flying Service: The Decorated Career of Wing Cdr Akhtar

Wing Commander Akhtar, commissioned into the Indian Air Force on 15 December 2006, served the nation with distinction for 17 years. His career included key roles across the country—from training nearly 2,000 airmen at Air Force Station Tambaram to administrative leadership postings in Chandigarh and Allahabad. He also represented India internationally in a Young Officers’ Exchange Program with the Royal Thai Air Force.

He played a crucial role during the devastating 2018 Kerala floods, coordinating rescue and relief operations while serving at the Southern Air Command. After taking voluntary retirement (VRS) in July 2022 due to family commitments, Akhtar has been actively mentoring youth aspiring to join the armed forces and working with underprivileged students.

From Combat to Courtroom: A Veteran’s Fight for the Vote

According to Akhtar, his name was placed “under adjudication” during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR). However, before he could even be called for a hearing, his name was deleted in the second supplementary list released on March 28, 2026.

The Wing Commander (Retd) claims he followed all instructions issued by the Election Commission and remained in constant touch with the BLO at every step. “My name was there in the final list, so I had nothing to act on. But in the first supplementary list on March 23, it was marked ‘under adjudication’. I contacted my BLO, Mondal, but he did not tell me any procedure to follow and assured me that it would be restored automatically. Then on March 28, when my name was deleted in the second list, the BLO told me to hire a lawyer and approach the tribunal,” rued Akhtar.

What makes the case more puzzling is that:

Longevity: His name had been part of the electoral rolls since 2002.

Family Status: His family members’ names continue to remain on the list.

Lack of Due Process: No formal hearing or opportunity for clarification was provided.

The incident has sparked outrage among sections of civil society, with some questioning whether the deletion could be linked to the officer’s identity as a Muslim. “When a decorated officer with an impeccable service record is denied even a hearing, it naturally raises questions,” said Athar Firdausi, a rights activist.

Recently, Alt News, in its report “Bengal SIR: The Wall ECI Built Around Electoral Data and How We Broke Through It,” highlighted large-scale discrepancies, claiming that voters from communities less likely to support the BJP were disproportionately targeted for deletion or placed under doubt.

However, the Wing Commander is not the only alleged victim of the controversial SIR process. The list is long. eNewsroom has also reported that AGWB gazetted officer Reshma Shirin Iqbal’s name was deleted in a similar manner. Former Calcutta High Court judge Sahidullah Munshi’s name was also removed, and he publicly stated that the experience was not only humiliating but left him unsure of where to seek redress. It has also been reported that the names of the grandson and granddaughter-in-law of Indian Constitution illustrator Nandalal Bose were dropped.

Courtesy: https://enewsroom.in

The post No Hearing, No Notice, Just Deletion: How Bengal’s SIR Erased a Decorated IAF Officer appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The incidents documented across India in 2025, when read collectively, mark a decisive shift in the nature of anti-Christian hostility. What was once episodic violence or localised discrimination has now hardened into a pattern of systemic persecution—socially legitimised, politically emboldened, and administratively enabled. Christians were not merely attacked as individuals or congregations; they were recast as a civilisational problem, a demographic threat, and a suspect population whose very presence required surveillance, regulation, and punishment.

This article undertakes a deep, incident-driven analysis of the violence, intimidation, discrimination, and institutional harassment faced by Christians throughout 2025. Drawing exclusively from the documented incidents provided, it traces how hate speech translated into physical violence, how law was repurposed as a tool of repression, and how everyday Christian life—worship, burial, marriage, education, and celebration—was progressively criminalised. The focus is not merely on what happened, but on how these events collectively reveal an architecture of otherisation that corrodes constitutional guarantees and reshapes citizenship itself. 

Manufacturing the Enemy: Christians as ‘foreign’, ‘anti-national’, and ‘dangerous’

A central pillar of anti-Christian mobilisation in 2025 was the persistent portrayal of Christians as outsiders to the Indian nation. Speakers across states repeatedly asserted that Christianity is inherently foreign—linked to the Vatican, Western powers, or colonial rule—and therefore incompatible with Indian culture. This rhetoric erased the long history of Indian Christianity, including indigenous traditions dating back centuries, and reframed faith as a marker of disloyalty.

The “holy land” disqualification: In Maharashtra and beyond, influential voices like Dhananjay Desai propagated a dangerous geopolitical argument: that because the “holy places” of Christians (the Vatican) and Muslims (Arabia) lie outside India, their loyalty to the Indian state is fundamentally compromised. This narrative effectively created a “Permanent Outsider” status, suggesting that a Christian can never be a “true” Indian.[1]

Public rallies and religious gatherings consistently advanced the idea that “true Indians” cannot be Christian. By redefining national belonging through religious identity, these narratives transformed Christians into conditional citizens—present but perpetually suspect. This framing proved crucial in legitimising subsequent acts of exclusion: if Christians are not truly Indian, then denying them burial rights, worship spaces, or legal protection can be portrayed as acts of cultural defence rather than discrimination.

The ‘foreign religion’ trope also intersected with anxieties about land, resources, and sovereignty. Christians—particularly among Adivasi communities—were accused of acting as agents of foreign interests, allegedly facilitating land grabs or undermining tribal traditions. These claims, devoid of evidence, circulated freely at public events, often in the presence of political leaders, lending them a veneer of legitimacy. 

The ideological framework – language as a weapon

Before the first stone was cast thrown in 2025, the groundwork was laid through a sophisticated linguistic campaign of dehumanisation. The “Otherisation” process relied on specific tropes designed to make the Christian community appear “un-Indian.”

The year 2025 saw the mainstreaming of derogatory slurs:

• “Rice bag” Christians: A trope used by figures like Kajal Hindustani to suggest that faith is a transaction and that converts are “purchasable” and thus lack integrity. (Also read CJP’s Hate Buster on this perennial slur against Indian Christians here.)
• “Chaddar and Father”: A rhyming slur used by Raju Das and Gautam Khattar to group Muslims and Christians into a single “alien threat,” often referred to as a “demonic illness” or a “cancer” that needs to be “cured” through violence.
• The “shoe” metaphor: In Haryana, Mahant Shukrai Nath Yogi explicitly stated he began wearing shoes specifically to “confront” missionaries, a metaphor for crushing and humiliating the “Other.” This was later echoed in Jhabua with slogans like “Isai ke dalalo ko, joote maaro saalo ko” (Beat the agents of Christianity with shoes). 

Conspiracy theories as political technology

Throughout 2025, conspiracy theories functioned as a key technology of mobilisation. The discourse of “love jihad,” initially directed at Muslims, was increasingly redeployed against Christians. Hindu nationalist leaders warned that Christian men were luring Hindu women into relationships to facilitate conversion, framing intimacy and marriage as weapons of religious warfare.

Equally pervasive was the narrative of “rice-bag conversions,” which cast Christian converts—especially Dalits and Adivasis—as morally weak, economically desperate, and incapable of exercising genuine choice. Conversion was framed not as conscience but as corruption. This discourse carried a deeply casteist subtext: it denied marginalised communities’ agency while reinforcing upper-caste paternalism.

Other conspiracies— “land jihad,” “drug jihad,” demographic replacement—were invoked to suggest that Christians operate through hidden networks aimed at destabilising Hindu society. The repetition of these narratives across regions points to ideological coordination rather than spontaneous fear.

Hate speech as infrastructure for violence

Hate speech in 2025 did not merely express prejudice; it actively prepared the ground for violence. Speeches openly called for social boycotts, forced reconversion, and the physical elimination of Christian presence. Chants advocating the destruction of missionaries crossed into explicit incitement.

Speakers frequently invoked mythological violence, comparing Christians to demons or invaders whose defeat was framed as a sacred duty. References to weapons, martial training, and vigilantism were common, signalling a shift from symbolic hostility to endorsement of physical force.

The impunity enjoyed by hate speakers is critical. Despite the public nature of these speeches, legal consequences were rare. The absence of state intervention functioned as tacit sanction, emboldening followers and normalising extremist rhetoric.

 Policing Worship: Raids, surveillance, and the criminalisation of Christian prayer

Throughout 2025, Christian worship—particularly prayer meetings held in private homes—became one of the most visible and repeatedly targeted sites of persecution. The incident record shows a consistent, cross-state pattern: Hindu nationalist groups would accuse Christians of engaging in forced or fraudulent conversions; mobs would arrive at prayer meetings, disrupt worship, and summon the police; law enforcement would then detain pastors or hosts, seize Bibles and religious material, and register cases under anti-conversion or public order laws.

These raids occurred across Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Odisha, and Chhattisgarh. In Uttar Pradesh alone, multiple prayer meetings were raided following complaints by Bajrang Dal or VHP activists, even when attendees stated on record that they were participating voluntarily. In several cases, worship was forcibly stopped mid-prayer, with congregants verbally abused, threatened with violence, or compelled to chant Hindu religious slogans.

In Maharashtra, women attending Bible study gatherings were filmed and interrogated by Hindu vigilantes, accused of illegal religious activity, and pressured to disclose personal information. In Bihar and Rajasthan, elderly worshippers and women were forced to disperse while pastors were taken to police stations for questioning. In Odisha, prayer gatherings were followed by police violence against worshippers, including physical assaults documented by fact-finding teams.

These incidents collectively establish that Christian worship itself was treated as presumptively illegal. The home—constitutionally protected as a private sphere—was transformed into a surveilled space where religious expression invited state intervention. The cumulative effect of these raids was not merely disruption but deterrence: Christians learned that gathering to pray could lead to public humiliation, arrest, and long-term harassment.

Instances:

1. Location: Mayapur, Sidhi, Madhya Pradesh

Date: January 17

Bajrang Dal members, led by Rishi Shukla, raided a Christian prayer meeting held at a household. They harassed the attendees, accused them of engaging in religious conversions, and called the police.

2. Location: Fatehpur, Uttar Pradesh

Date: January 27

Members of Bajrang Dal, along with the police, raided a Christian family’s house accusing them of engaging in religious conversion. They presented the Bibles in the house as evidence and arrested the couple.

3. Location: Khargapur, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh

Date: February 9

Members of the Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha attempted to raid a Christian Sunday prayer meeting held in a church at a residence, accusing the attendees of religious conversion. The police confirmed that the church is registered and holds regular prayer meetings but directed them to suspend gatherings until the investigation is complete.

4. Location: Bargarh, Odisha

Date: February 9

Members of Bajrang Dal raided a Christian prayer meeting, alleging forced religious conversions and demanding it be stopped. The attendees pushed back, questioning their authority. https://t.me/hindutvawatchin/1444

5. Location: Bikaner, Rajasthan

Date: February 16

Members of Bajrang Dal and Hindu Jagran Manch raided a Christian prayer meeting at a private residence, assaulting attendees and vandalising the property while accusing them of indulging in religious conversion. During the attack, they chanted slogans of “Jai Shree Ram” and “Narendra Modi Zindabad” as part of their protest. The police detained 6-7 individuals on accusations of religious conversion.

6. Location: Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh

Date: March 20

Members of Hindu nationalist organisations, led by Thakur Ram Singh and backed by the police, raided a Christian prayer meeting at a conference hall. They alleged that attendees were being trained to brainwash and convert Hindus. The police arrested three individuals acting on their complaint.

Anti-Conversion Laws: Legal architecture of suspicion and control

Anti-conversion laws operated throughout 2025 as the primary legal framework through which Christian life was criminalised. While framed as safeguards against coercion, the documented incidents show that these laws were overwhelmingly used against Christians on the basis of unverified complaints by Hindu nationalist groups rather than testimonies of affected individuals.

Across Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Odisha, pastors, prayer leaders, and ordinary believers were arrested during or after prayer meetings. FIRs were registered even when alleged converts explicitly denied any force, inducement, or deception. In several Uttar Pradesh cases, police booked Christian couples or pastors under the state’s anti-conversion law solely because prayer was taking place in a domestic setting.

The first reported convictions of Christians under certain state anti-conversion laws marked a critical escalation. These convictions sent a chilling message beyond the individuals involved: Christian worship and evangelism—even when peaceful and consensual—could result in imprisonment. In Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, anti-conversion provisions were frequently combined with charges of unlawful assembly or public nuisance, enabling prolonged detention and heightened intimidation.

Rather than preventing coercion, these laws functioned as instruments of surveillance and discipline. They legitimised mob vigilance, emboldened police intervention, and transformed religious belief into a legally suspect activity.

Instances:

1. Location: Gokarna, Karnataka

Date: June 22

Far-right Hindu nationalists barged into a private Christian prayer meeting; instead of acting against the attackers, police filed an FIR against the worshippers over false conversion claims.

2. Location: Burhanpur, Madhya Pradesh

Date: June 25

Far-right Hindu nationalists brutally stripped, beat, and interrogated Adivasi Christians, falsely accusing them of religious conversions. Police filed an FIR against six Christians, while the attackers faced no action. As the video went viral, demands grew to prosecute the assailants, who, according to the victims, are upper-caste men affiliated with the Bajrang Dal.

Police complicity and administrative alignment

The role of the police across the documented incidents reveals a systemic collapse of institutional neutrality. In numerous cases, police arrived at prayer meetings alongside Hindu nationalist mobs or acted directly on their complaints without independent verification. Christians were detained, questioned, or arrested, while aggressors were rarely booked.

In Uttar Pradesh, there were repeated instances where pastors were detained while the individuals who disrupted worship faced no consequences. In one incident, a pastor’s wife was arrested following an attack on their prayer meeting, while those who assaulted the congregation went uncharged. In Odisha, fact-finding reports documented police assaulting Christian worshippers—including children and priests—during raids on church premises.

Administrative authorities also played a role in reinforcing exclusion. In Chhattisgarh villages where Christian families were denied burial rights, sarpanches and local officials justified the exclusion as adherence to “local custom.” Police were present during several burial denials yet failed to intervene, effectively endorsing the discrimination.

This alignment between police, administration, and vigilante groups produced a regime of structural impunity. Christians were left without effective legal recourse, trapped between mob violence and state hostility.

Institutional response and media coverage

Despite the violence, high-level official response was muted. Occasionally courts intervened (e.g. Supreme Court rebuked Chhattisgarh in the tribal burial case), but on the whole, police and governments largely upheld anti-conversion crackdowns. In regions where BJP governments held power, anti-Christian laws were zealously enforced (e.g. first UP conviction). BJP leaders voiced no regret over extremists’ speeches, and sometimes echoed the fear rhetoric themselves.

Mainstream media coverage of anti-Christian incidents in 2025 frequently diluted their communal character. Raids on prayer meetings were framed as routine law-and-order actions; burial denials were described as village disputes; arrests under anti-conversion laws were reported without scrutiny of evidentiary basis.

By contrast, independent media outlets and civil society organisations documented patterns across states, tracking hate speeches, arrests, and coordinated attacks. Their reporting reveals the scale, consistency, and ideological coherence of the persecution that mainstream narratives often obscured.

This narrative dilution played a crucial role in normalisation. When violence is fragmented into isolated events and stripped of its structural context, it becomes easier for society and institutions to accept persecution as ordinary governance rather than constitutional breakdown.

In summary, the institutional picture is one of complicity or wilful negligence. Police frequently treated Christian worship as a crime, and only rarely held Hindu attackers accountable. For example, after mobs raided an Odisha village burning Bibles, local police were slow to file charges; journalists had to push coverage for any action. Even when arrests were made, they were usually of Christians under anti-conversion laws (not the mobs). Several incident reports note explicitly that police either joined the persecutors (as at Bilaspur, CG) or simply failed to prevent ongoing intimidation.

Denial of Dignity: Burials, death, and civil exclusion

One of the most severe and symbolically devastating forms of persecution documented in 2025 was the repeated denial of burial rights to Christians. In multiple villages in Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh, Christian families—often Dalit or Adivasi—were prevented from burying their dead in common burial grounds.

In several incidents, families were forced to transport bodies over long distances to find a place for burial, sometimes under police escort. In one prominent case, the denial of burial to an elderly Christian man in a tribal area prompted judicial intervention, with higher courts reprimanding the state for failing to protect basic dignity.

Other incidents reveal even harsher coercion: local leaders demanded that families undergo reconversion to Hinduism as a condition for allowing burial. These acts were not spontaneous expressions of social prejudice but organised practices of exclusion, enforced through threats and administrative inaction.

Denial of burial constitutes a form of civil death. It communicates that Christians are excluded from the moral and social community—not only in life, but even in death. These practices closely mirror historical caste-based exclusions, revealing how religious persecution in 2025 intersected with entrenched hierarchies of purity and pollution. The denial of burial is the ultimate expression of “Otherisation.” It suggests that the Christian body is so “alien” that it cannot even be permitted to decompose in the soil of its own homeland.

Instances:

1. Location: Surat, Gujarat

Date: February 1

Hindu nationalists, led by Narendra Choudhary, forced out a group of Christian individuals who had come to collect a man’s body for burial. The Christian group claimed that the man was Christian and the family called them. However, the goons accused them of forcefully converting Hindus, and made them leave along with the coffin.

2. Location: Sanaud, Durg, Chhattisgarh

Date: May 26

During the burial of a Christian woman, villagers—pressured by Hindu nationalists and a village sarpanch sympathetic to Hindu nationalist ideology—refused to allow her burial at the public Muktidham, claiming the land was reserved for Adivasi tribals. Despite the presence of police and the SDM, officials did not intervene. The family buried her 30 km away in Dhamtari.

3. Location: Parsoda, Durg, Chhattisgarh

Date: December 8

Members of VHP-Bajrang Dal, along with other villagers, staged a protest opposing the burial of an 85-year-old Dalit Christian man in the public cremation ground. Tension escalated as both sides refused to back down. Police intervened to control the situation. Authorities later directed the family to bury the body on their privately owned land instead of the public cremation ground.

Cultural Erasure: Festivals, symbols, institutions, and public space

Beyond physical violence and legal harassment, 2025 witnessed sustained attempts to erase Christian presence from public and cultural life. Christmas celebrations were repeatedly targeted. In Gujarat, shopkeepers were threatened and pressured to remove Christmas decorations and religious items. In other states, public displays associated with Christian festivals were portrayed as cultural provocation.

Educational institutions also came under pressure. Universities and colleges cancelled lectures or academic events following objections by Hindu nationalist groups alleging religious propaganda. These cancellations extended the logic of persecution into intellectual and cultural spaces, framing even discussion of Christianity as suspect.

Church structures and prayer halls were demolished or sealed in parts of Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh, often with administrative backing. These actions were justified on technical or zoning grounds, masking their communal intent. The cumulative effect was the shrinking of public space available to Christians for worship, celebration, and community life.

Cultural erasure complemented physical violence by rendering Christianity increasingly invisible, reinforcing the message that Christian identity must remain private, silent, and subordinate.

A detailed report may be read here.

Territorial Warfare – Schools and the battle for the mind

In 2025, the “Otherisation” project moved into the classroom. Christian missionary schools—long respected for their contribution to Indian education—were reframed as “conversion factories.”

Forcible ritualism: In Hojai, Assam (Feb 14), the Rashtriya Bajrang Dal staged a Saraswati Puja at the gates of a Christian school. This was an act of “territorial marking,” asserting that the majority’s rituals must supersede the school’s private character.

Iconoclasm and dress codes: In Burhanpur, MP, the removal of a plaque with a quote from Jesus Christ illustrated a desire to scrub the public landscape of Christian thought. Furthermore, leaders like Suresh Chavhanke attacked the very attire of Christian teachers, labeling “Isai dress” as a psychological threat to children. By attacking the symbols and clothes of the community, the movement sought to make the Christian presence invisible.

Intersectionality: Caste, tribe, gender, and the differential impact of persecution

The incidents recorded in 2025 demonstrate that anti-Christian persecution operated through intersecting axes of vulnerability. Dalit and Adivasi Christians were disproportionately affected. In tribal regions of Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh, Christian families faced threats of eviction, social boycott, denial of burial, and forced reconversion.

Conversion among marginalised communities was framed as betrayal—both of Hindu religion and of caste order. This framing justified intensified punishment and surveillance. The language used against Dalit and Adivasi Christians often echoed older casteist tropes of impurity and contamination.

Intersectionality magnified vulnerability: faith, caste, tribe, and gender converged to produce heightened exposure to violence and exclusion. Analysis of the data shows that Hindu militants often targeted socially vulnerable Christians. Tribal and Dalit Christians were singled out in multiple incidents. For example, in Durg (Chhattisgarh) villagers blocked the burial of an 85-year-old Dalit Christian man at the public ground, explicitly citing tribal land rights to exclude him. Similarly, a tribal Christian woman in Sanaud was denied a resting place at the village cremation ground. In Assam, Hindutva leaders accused Christian missionaries of undermining tribal society, part of a broader narrative of “protecting Adivasi culture” from conversion. In Madhya Pradesh and Jharkhand, Christian converts from local tribes or Dalit castes were especially vulnerable to accusations of “stealing” tribals from Hindu fold (for example the Khapabhat raid).

Gender was another axis. Women were often the direct targets of conversion gossip and social pressure. Incidents in Mumbai and West Bengal show women being publicly humiliated for their faith. Even when men were attacked, their Christian daughters and wives were threatened – e.g. a Kanker (Chhattisgarh) case where girls were shouted at to renounce Christianity under threat of eviction. The logic of “protecting Hindu women” underpinned many hate speeches and attacks. The intersection of gender and religion thus magnified the harassment of female Christians, who were portrayed as spoils of conversion conspiracies.

Caste bias intersected: several persecuted Christian families belonged to lower castes. In several villages, families were pressured to sign documents renouncing Christianity or face ostracism. A MaktoobMedia report notes tribal families in one Chhattisgarh village were forced to sign a “pact” to convert back within days. Even police actions showed caste dimensions: often the accused Christians were Tribals or Dalits, while the accusers were higher-caste Hindus. These layers of caste and gender made it harder for Christian victims to seek redress, as local power structures favoured the Hindu aggressors.

Geography and Escalation: From local attacks to a national pattern

The incidents span much of India, but some states saw particularly high frequency. Uttar Pradesh (37 incidents in the list) and Madhya Pradesh (35) were the worst-hit, reflecting both active VHP-Bajrang Dal chapters and strict anti-conversion laws. These states witnessed many police raids on pastors and prayer meetings, as well as major hate rallies. Chhattisgarh (26 incidents) was also notable, partly due to its large tribal Christian population and local Hindu chauvinist cells (Chhattisgarh saw everything from villages denying burials to BJP-minister-led hate speeches). In the West, Maharashtra (17 incidents) had frequent church raids (e.g. Mumbai and Nashik) and provocative temple ceremonies near Christian schools. Gujarat (9 incidents) saw actions like forcing shopkeepers to curb Christmas sales and at least one case of Bajrang Dal harassment of a Christian family. Eastern and southern states were not immune: Odisha and Bengal had mob attacks on Christians (Odisha families were violently threatened in June; a Bengal mob forcibly imposed a tulsi shrine on a Christian home). Even Nepal’s Terai region saw hate speeches against Christians in January, showing the cross-border spread of these narratives.

Temporally, incidents clustered around Hindu religious or national events. January (just after Ram Mandir consecration) saw several hate-speech gatherings (e.g. Garhwa, Jharkhand) and anti-Christmas actions. February–March featured VHP-sponsored school pujas and rallies (e.g. Saraswati Puja disruptions, several raids by Bajrang Dal). Notably, the highest count was in September (26 incidents) – a period when state elections (e.g. Chhattisgarh MP, Mizoram) and Hindu festivals like Ganesh Chaturthi took place, possibly spurring extremist visibility. Another spike came in December (19 incidents), reflecting year-end polarization (for example, arrests after Republic Day protests).

Overall, the pattern is escalatory and sustained: incidents continued each month with shifting focus (speech rallies give way to mob actions and police crackdowns). No period saw a complete lull. The unbroken string of events from January to December suggests a systemic campaign rather than isolated flare-ups.

Role of Hindu nationalist (read supremacist) organisations

A clear pattern emerges in the perpetrators: the vast majority are linked to Hindu nationalist groups. Bajrang Dal and VHP feature in almost every state account. Bajrang Dal cadres raided prayer meetings in UP, Bihar, MP and Maharashtra, often accompanied by police. The VHP sponsored large events preaching anti-Christian rhetoric (e.g. press conferences in MP, strategy meetings in Balaghat). RSS-affiliated outfits also took part: for example, at an Adivasi conference in Alirajpur (MP), BJP minister Nagarsingh Chauhan warned that Christian conversions among tribals would ignite conflict. The Ayodhya and Kumbh events were spurred by RSS leaders advocating armed “self-defense.”

Smaller groups like Hindu Jagran Manch (HJM) and Hindu Mahasabha were also active. In Mumbai and Assam, HJM members disrupted prayer services and harassed congregants. The Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha attempted to storm a Lucknow church on February 9. These fringe groups often coordinate with VHP-Bajrang Dal outings (e.g. marking Trishul Deeksha ceremonies), using religion to justify street aggression.

Major BJP politicians and influencers lent indirect support. BJP MPs like Bhojraj Nag (Chhattisgarh) equated tribals converting to Christianity with “anti-national activities,” even misquoting the Supreme Court to forbid Christian cremations in Fifth Schedule areas. Some state BJP leaders shared or did not repudiate extremist podium speeches – in Maharashtra a BJP adviser sanctioned Dhananjay Desai’s hate speech on “holy places in Arabia and Vatican”. More subtly, no major party figure vigorously condemned these attacks; indeed, BJP-run state administrations have often defended anti-conversion laws or appealed for Hindu unity in the name of nationalism, tacitly encouraging extremists. Even government-published Hindu religious calendars made headlines by warning Hindus to avoid Christian places (e.g. Andhra Pradesh’s 2025 calendar, though not in our incidents list, followed this trend).

Outside activists have noted this complicity. Christian organisations have written to top officials (including Prime Minister’s office and Human Rights Commission), highlighting that “even the dead aren’t spared” – as one film-maker put it of Pastor Baghel’s burial case. These groups point out that ultra-right vigilantes enjoy de facto impunity in many regions, and allege that local administrations either support or ignore anti-Christian mobs.

Summary of patterns

The 2025 incidents demonstrate systematic persecution of Christians driven by organized hate ideology. Key patterns include:

• Recurring hate narratives: Leaders regularly invoked conspiracies (“love jihad,” “conversion rackets,” foreign backing) that framed Christianity as a national danger. These narratives guided the actions of mobs and organizers.
• Coordinated militant actions: Groups like Bajrang Dal, VHP, RSS-affiliates, and vigilante outfits colluded in raids on homes and churches across multiple states.
• State-sanctioned harassment: Many raids and arrests were carried out jointly by Bajrang Dal activists and police or by police on Hindutva complaints. This shows institutional bias in enforcing anti-conversion laws.
• Geographic hotspots: While nearly every region saw incidents, UP, MP, Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra stand out as epicenters of legal and physical assaults. Eastern states saw new forms of intimidation (e.g. forced religious homicides in Odisha and West Bengal).
• Cultural marginalisation: Attacks extended beyond physical violence to cultural exclusion: Christian festivals and symbols were suppressed (Christmas items banned), burials were obstructed, and Christian education was targeted.
• Intersectional targeting: Marginalised-caste and tribal Christians, as well as women, bore the brunt of violence. Social prejudices overlapped – e.g. Dalit Christians faced casteist burial bans, and women were singled out in conversion narratives.

In all, the compiled data from 2025 indicates an organised campaign of persecution rather than sporadic incidents. The interplay of hate speech (spread at public events and online), legal tools (anti-conversion laws, biased policing) and communal violence paints a picture of institutionalized harassment. Right-wing groups exploited narratives of national security and cultural purity to justify attacks. Without accountability or countervailing political will, Christians remained vulnerable to both mob violence and state repression throughout the year.

Conclusion: 2025 as a year of systemic otherisation and constitutional breakdown

The year 2025 was not just a year of “attacks”; it was a year of “erasure.” The data shows a community being systematically pushed out of the public square, the classroom, the legal system, and the graveyard.

The “Otherisation” of Christians in 2025 was achieved by:

1. Stripping Agency: Treating all conversion as “bribed” or “forced.”
2. Stripping Dignity: Using slurs and physical humiliation (shoes, sticks).
3. Stripping Territory: Removing Christian symbols from schools and bodies from villages.

The incidents of 2025 serve as a stark warning. When the state and the mob align to define who is a “true” citizen based on faith, the very concept of a secular, democratic India is under existential threat. The Christian community in 2025 became the “canary in the coal mine,” signalling a broader collapse of constitutional values and the rise of a majoritarian order that seeks to define India not by its diversity, but by its exclusions.

The incidents documented across 2025 do not describe a series of unfortunate excesses or isolated communal flare-ups. Taken together, they reveal a systematic process of otherisation in which Christians were progressively stripped of constitutional protection, civic dignity, and social legitimacy. What emerges is not episodic violence, but a patterned regime of control.

Christian worship was transformed into an object of suspicion; prayer became a trigger for police action. Anti-conversion laws supplied the legal vocabulary through which belief itself was criminalised, while vigilante accusations were absorbed seamlessly into state action. Policing practices collapsed the distinction between complainant and accused, allowing mobs to function as de facto extensions of law enforcement. Even death did not interrupt exclusion: burial denials marked the most extreme assertion that Christians could be expelled from the moral community altogether.

Equally significant was the attempt to erase Christianity from public and cultural space. Festivals were suppressed, symbols removed, institutions pressured into silence. This shrinking of visibility worked alongside physical violence to communicate a single message: Christian identity was permissible only if invisible, silent, and politically irrelevant.

The media’s fragmentation of these events into localised disputes completed the architecture of persecution. By denying structural context, public discourse neutralised outrage and normalised exclusion. Violence became governance; discrimination became administration.

The persecution of Christians in 2025 must therefore be understood as a constitutional failure. When freedom of religion is subordinated to majoritarian ideology, equality before law becomes illusory. When police and administration align with prejudice, citizenship fractures along religious lines. The question raised by 2025 is not merely about the safety of one minority, but about the survivability of secular democracy itself.

2025 stands as a warning year — a record of how swiftly constitutional guarantees can be hollowed out when law, institutions, and public narratives are mobilised against a community. Ignoring this record risks accepting a future in which belonging is conditional, rights are selective, and democracy itself becomes exclusionary by design.

The analysis above is based entirely on incidents documented in the provided compilation.

References:

The article also lists the following external references, which corroborate and expand on these events:

• https://maktoobmedia.com/india/sc-slams-chhattisgarh-govt-as-tribal-christian-man-unable-to-bury-father/
• https://www.livelaw.in/top-stories/were-pained-supreme-court-on-plea-of-christian-man-unable-to-bury-father-in-native-village-in-chhattisgarh-281453
• https://maktoobmedia.com/india/christian-collective-reports-245-incidents-of-violence-against-christians-within-the-last-3-months-in-india/
• https://thewire.in/communalism/chhattisgarh-christian-family-hounded-by-hindutva-mob-forced-into-hiding-police-refuses-fir#:~:text=Zeeshan%20Kaskar,church%20service%20was%20in%20progress.
•  https://persecution.org/2025/01/27/christian-husband-wife-first-to-be-convicted-under-anti-conversion-law/
• https://www.ucanews.com/news/police-arrest-7-indian-christians-for-conversion-on-republic-day/107706
• https://www.newindianexpress.com/states/tamil-nadu/2025/Mar/10/university-of-madras-cancels-lecture-on-christianity-after-social-media-backlash
• https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/kerala/pc-george-stirs-another-controversy-calls-for-early-marriage-of-christian-girls-citing-love-jihad/article69313391.ece
• https://sabrangindia.in/from-protectors-to-perpetrators-police-assaulted-women-children-christian-priests-in-odisha-fact-finding-report/    
• https://www.genocidewatch.com/single-post/hindu-extremists-threaten-genocide-against-christians
• https://persecution.org/2025/06/30/hindu-nationalist-mob-attacks-20-christian-families-in-odisha/
• https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/kerala/church-mouthpiece-slams-bjps-double-standards-amid-push-to-woo-christians-in-kerala/article69809988.ece
• https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/pune/christian-groups-protest-mla-padalkars-religious-leaders-10114467/
• https://muslimmirror.com/tamil-nadu-dalit-christians-allege-denial-of-entry-from-church-rituals-stage-protest-demanding-swift-action/ 
• https://cjp.org.in/no-rest-even-in-death-christians-in-india-and-the-growing-targeted-violence-in-chhattisgarh/
• https://www.christiandaily.com/news/church-members-in-india-afraid-to-attend-worship-after-assault

[1] This is a propaganda outcome of the original hardline far right argument for a ‘Hindu nation’originally conceived by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar in his book, written in the Cellular Jail under the title “Essentials pf Hindutva” in 1923. Characterising the ‘Hindu’ through Religion, Faith, Nationality and Belonging he coined the phrashes ‘Pitrabhoomi’ (Land of the Ancestors, Fatherland) and ‘Punyabhoomi’ (Holy Land). By extension of this exclusivist definition, the loyalty and belonging of ‘others’ like Christians and Muslims is forever in question because their points of worship and faith lie outside the geographical boundaries of the nation.

The post The Siege of Faith: A year-long analysis of the persecution and otherisation of Christians in India appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Press Statement by Indian Muslims for Secular Democracy (IMSD)

Indian Muslims for Secular Democracy (IMSD) wholeheartedly welcomes the recent observations made by the Supreme Court of India during the hearing of a petition filed by Poulomi P. Shukla. Argued by senior advocate Prashant Bhushan, the case seeks to rectify the long-standing disparity in inheritance rights for Muslim women—a move IMSD views as a vital step toward fulfilling the democratic promise of the Indian Constitution.

The Supreme Court Raises the Question of Gender Justice

A three-judge bench, led by Chief Justice Surya Kant and including Justices Joymalya Bagchi and R. Mahadevan, observed that a Uniform Civil Code (UCC) may be the “most effective answer” to removing gender bias in laws governing marriage, succession, and property rights. This observation came while examining a plea challenging the Muslim Personal Law (Shariat) Application Act, 1937, which the petitioners argue forces unequal inheritance outcomes for women compared to their male counterparts.

A Constitutional Challenge to Discriminatory Laws

Appearing for the petitioner, Adv. Prashant Bhushan argued that the inferior inheritance rights granted to women under the 1937 Act are a direct violation of constitutional guarantees. He emphasized that inheritance is fundamentally a civil and property right; therefore, it cannot be insulated from constitutional scrutiny by invoking religious freedom.

Addressing the Court’s concern that striking down discriminatory portions of the Shariat Act might create a “legal vacuum,” Bhushan proposed a pragmatic and immediate remedy: including Muslim women under the ambit of the Indian Succession Act, 1925. This would provide a robust, existing legal framework to ensure parity without leaving women in a state of legal uncertainty.

Gender Bias: A Problem Beyond One Community

Crucially, the Hon’ble Bench noted that gender discrimination in inheritance is not confined to Muslim personal law alone. The Court observed that inequalities persist within the structure of Hindu Undivided Families (HUFs) and various customary or tribal practices. As highlighted in various reports, inheritance rights remain skewed in Hindu law as well, indicating that the struggle for property rights is a cross-community challenge.

The Constitutional Framework: Equality and Dignity

IMSD believes the core of this petition is rooted in Constitutional Morality. The Constitution of India clearly guarantees:

* Article 14: Equality before the law and equal protection of the laws.

* Article 15: Prohibition of discrimination on grounds including religion and sex.

* Article 21: Protection of life, dignity, and personal liberty.

These guarantees must apply fully to Muslim women as equal citizens. While Islamic jurisprudence recognized women’s property rights over fourteen centuries ago, contemporary patriarchal interpretations and social pressures often compel women to relinquish their rightful shares.

Moving Toward Reform

IMSD reiterates that the debate on the UCC has often been politicized by forces seeking to target minority communities. However, gender justice cannot be postponed indefinitely due to identity politics or communal polarization. True reform must be a collaborative effort involving women’s organizations, legal scholars, and minority voices to ensure it is rooted in justice rather than stigmatization.

The Muslim community leadership must also reflect on its historical resistance to reform. This reluctance has often denied justice to women and strengthened communal narratives.

Conclusion: A Call for Constitutional Justice

IMSD supports the ongoing Supreme Court proceedings and calls for a resolution that guarantees equal inheritance rights for Muslim women across India. We advocate for a solution that addresses gender discrimination in all personal laws, ensuring that women from all communities are treated as equal citizens entitled to dignity and justice under the law.

List of Signatories

* Adv. A. J. Jawad – IMSD, Chennai

* Amir Rizvi – Designer, IMSD, Mumbai

* Arshad Alam – Veteran Journalist, IMSD, Delhi

* Askari Zaidi – IMSD, Mumbai

* Bilal Khan – IMSD, Mumbai

* Feroze Mithiborwala, IMSD Co-Convener, Mumbai

* Guddi S. L. – Hum Bharat Ke Log, Mumbai

* Hasina Khan – Bebaak Collective, Navi Mumbai

* Irfan Engineer – CSSS, Mumbai

* Javed Anand, Convener, IMSD, Mumbai

* Jeibunnisa Reyaz – Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan, BMMA, Madurai

* Khatoon Sheikh – BMMA, Mumbai

* Adv. Lara Jesani – IMSD, Mumbai

* Mariya Salim – BMMA, New Delhi

* Nasreen M – BMMA, Karnataka

* Nasreen Rangoonwala – IMSD, Mumbai

* Nishat Hussain – BMMA, Jaipur

* Niyazmin Daiya – BMMA, Delhi

* Noorjehan Safiya Niyaz – BMMA, Mumbai

* Prof. Nasreen Fazalbhoy – IMSD, Mumbai

* Rahima Khatun – BMMA, Kolkata

* Salim Sabuwala – IMSD, Mumbai

* Prof. Sandeep Pandey – Magsaysay Awardee, Lucknow

* Sandhya Gokhale – Forum Against Oppression of Women, Mumbai

* Shabana Dean – IMSD, Pune

* Shafaq Khan – Theater Personality, IMSD, Mumbai

* Shalini Dhawan – Designer, IMSD, Mumbai

* Shama Zaidi – Scriptwriter, IMSD, Mumbai

* Shamsuddin Tamboli – Muslim Satyashodak Mandal

* Prof. Sujata Gothoskar – Forum Against Oppression of Women, Mumbai

* Sultan Shahin – Editor, New Age Islam, Delhi

* Dr. Sunilam – Farmer Leader, Gwalior

* Dr. Suresh Khairnar – Former President, Rashtriya Sewa Dal, Nagpur

* Yashodhan Paranjpe – IMSD, Social Activist, Mumbai

* Zakia Soman – BMMA, New Delhi

* Zeenat Shaukat Ali – Wisdom Foundation

The post Equal Inheritance Rights for Muslim Women: Upholding Constitutional Justice and Gender Equality appeared first on SabrangIndia.

As for the ‘Gujarat Freedom of Religion Act, 2003’, it is easily one of the most draconian ones in the history of any democracy in the world. Modi piloted this bill! During his election campaign in 2002, he ranted and raved against the Muslims and Christians and promised to bring in an anti-conversion law. True to his promise, he did so a few months later. At that time, the entire Opposition, in total disagreement with the bill, walked out of the Gujarat Assembly! It then took a full five years, until 2008, for the Gujarat Government to frame the necessary rules for the implementation of that law!

In February 2006, in keeping with letter and spirit of his anti-Constitutional law, at a Shabri Kumbh (a mass gathering of Hindus) programme in the Dangs (supported by the Gujarat Government), Modi warned the Christians “It is my constitutional duty to prevent conversions.  Our Constitution disapproves of them, and yet some people turn a blind eye.” Morari Bapu accused the Christians of bringing in planeloads of missionaries from the Vatican “who come here to carry out conversion activities but when we organise a ‘ghar wapsi’ why should it be termed as bad?”  Both Modi and Morari Bapu, unequivocally also endorsed the ‘ghar wapsi’ programmes, which were part of that Kumbh!

In 2009, the ‘Gujarat United Christian Forum for Human Rights’ and several other eminent citizens challenged the constitutional validity of the Gujarat Freedom of Religion Law, in the Gujarat High Court. A notice was sent by the Court to the Government to respond, they did not do so (obviously, they could not).The petitioners later withdrew their petition with an intention of making it stronger. In August 2021, the Gujarat High Court did not allow the Gujarat Government to make amendments to the already draconian law.

The bogey of ‘forced’ conversion and the introduction of anti – conversion laws (strangely called ‘Freedom of Religion’) are part of a well-oiled strategy of the ‘Sangh Parivar’ .These laws are blatantly unconstitutional. The States of Arunachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh already have these laws in place. On March 5, Maharashtra became the 13^th State to do so, when the Government of Maharashtra approved a draft anti-conversion bill requiring prior permission from a designated authority for religious conversion. Called the ‘Dharma Swatantrya Adhiniyam 2026 (Religious Freedom Act, 2026), the proposed law specifically aims to prevent individuals or organizations from carrying out forced or unlawful religious conversions. It seeks to protect individuals’ freedom of religion by prohibiting coercive or deceptive practices and imposing stringent penalties for violations.

On March 11, a collective of the Peoples Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) and the Bombay Catholic Sabha(BCS) among thirty civil society and human rights organisations held a well-attended media conference at the Press Club in Mumbai. At the Conference, several well-known citizens lambasted the Maharashtra Government for introducing this draconian legislation and without due process.

In a detailed statement released on the day, the signatory organisations said, “the text of the draft law has not yet been made public, raising serious concerns about transparency, democratic process, and the potential implications of the legislation for fundamental rights. The participating civil society organisations emphasise that legislation with far-reaching implications for religious freedom, privacy, and personal liberty cannot be drafted and introduced without public consultation, scrutiny, and debate. A growing pattern of anti-conversion laws framed around “love jihad” The proposed Maharashtra law appears to follow the pattern of anti-conversion legislation already enacted in several states under the banner of “freedom of religion” laws. While framed as measures to prevent coercion or fraudulent religious conversions, these statutes have frequently been justified politically through the narrative of “love jihad”—a conspiracy theory alleging that Muslim men systematically lure Hindu women into marriage in order to convert them. This claim has no legal basis.” 

Further, the statement said, “The Maharashtra proposal also comes at a time when the constitutional validity of similar anti-conversion laws across several states is already under challenge before the Supreme Court of India. A batch of writ petitions –first filed by Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP), Mumbai that is the lead petitioner in the Supreme Court– has been pending before the Supreme Court since 2020, raising fundamental constitutional questions about the scope of freedom of conscience, personal liberty, equality before the law, and the limits of State power in regulating religious conversion and interfaith relationships. Hearings in the matter that have happened intermittently with pressing demands made by CJP for an interim stay on the most egregious provisions are also scheduled today” 

The ‘bogey’ of forced conversion is once again being made into an issue! There is absolutely no evidence to substantiate this frivolous claim. It is a manipulative ploy, used by the Sanghis to defocus from the real issues, which grip the nation. India has proved to have a spineless Government, literally being held to ransom by the United States. We have lost our long-cherished identity as a non-aligned nation. The ordinary citizen is suffering due to a terrible scarcity of LPG (Smriti Irani seems to have done the disappearing trick instead of protesting!). The Epstein files have revealed names of some prominent Indians- a great shame to the nation. The Election Commission has proved to be a ‘caged parrot’ of the ruling regime! Corruption is the DNA of a Government, which has abdicated its responsibility to govern. Prices are skyrocketing, even as the poor become poorer and the crony capitalists friends of the regime continue to amass scandalous amounts of wealth. The common person is denied the legitimate right of ‘roti-kapda-makaan’ and Adivasis of ‘jal-jungle- jameen’.  The country is in the doldrums as never before! Besides, the ‘hindutvadis’ are a frightened group: they are aware that their so -called brand of ‘religiosity’ goes against human nature: the rights and freedoms, which are inalienable to every citizen.  Therefore, the ‘forced conversion’ gimmick is a convenient way to change the narrative and deflect from burning issues, which literally throttle the country today!

On November 14, 2022, a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court consisting of Justice M.R. Shah and Justice Hima Kohli observed that forced conversions may “ultimately affect the security of nation and freedom of religion and conscience of citizen.” The bench directed the Central Government to inform the Apex Court what steps it intends taking to curb deceitful or compulsory religious conversions. The bench was hearing a PIL by Ashwini Kumar Upadhyay, who has been filing several petitions of this kind in the past.  Upadhyay wants a law against ‘fraudulent religious conversion’ and ‘religious conversion by intimidation’, threatening, deceivingly luring through gifts and monetary benefits, as it offends Articles 14, 21, and 25.

Significantly, in April 2021, a three-judge bench of Justices Rohinton F Nariman, B.R. Gavai and Hrishikesh Roy had dismissed a similar petition by the Upadhyay himself and had even threatened to impose heavy costs if he persisted with the petition. The bench at that time had opined that any religious conversion law would be violative of the constitution as the constitution clearly allows joining of any religion of one’s choice and that is why the word “propagate” is in the Constitution. The bench termed “very harmful” the petition that asked a strict central law to check religious conversion and observed that adults are free to choose their faith. The bench also cautioned senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayan, who represented Upadhyay in the matter, “What kind of a petition is this? This is a very harmful petition. If you are going to argue this, we are going to impose a heavy cost on you”, said Nariman; he added, “There is a reason why the word ‘propagate’ is there in the Constitution. You have to have some meaning for that word. There is no reason why somebody above 18 cannot choose one’s own religion or somebody else’s religion,” The petition was immediately withdrawn!

The point therefore is not whether one has the right ‘to convert another’; but whether a citizen of India, has the right to choose a religion of one’s choice. Article 25 of the Constitution of India unequivocally “guarantees the freedom of conscience, the freedom to profess, practice and propagate religion to all citizens”. Besides, Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, asserts that “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance”.

As early as 1935, Dr. B. R.  Ambedkar made the most daring and path-breaking speech of his career, announcing that, because of the intransigence of privileged caste Hindus and the failure of a decade of nonviolent protests, he had decided to abandon Hinduism and to seek another faith. He urged the leaders at the Yeola Depressed Classes conference to consider their religious identity a choice, not a fact of destiny. In a highly emotional voice he said, “If you want to gain self-respect, change your religion. If you want to create a cooperating society, change your religion. If you want power, change your religion. If you want equality, change your religion. If you want independence, change your religion. If you want to make the world in which you live happy, change your religion”. About twenty years later, on 14 October 1956 (apparently the date on which King Ashoka became a Buddhist) Ambedkar together with his wife and at least 365,000 of his followers, mainly Dalits, decided to exit Hinduism and embrace Buddhism.

Is then an adult citizen of India free to choose the religion of one’s choice? The Supreme Court has to act with alacrity, maintaining the unconstitutionality of these draconian laws and strike them down in toto once and for all! Will it have the courage to take on the ‘hindutva’ brigade? That perhaps is another matter! 

March 14, 2026 

(The author is a human rights, reconciliation & peace activist and writer. Contact: cedricprakash@gmail.com )

Related:

35 civil society groups oppose Maharashtra’s proposed anti-conversion law, warn of threat to women’s autonomy and constitutional freedoms

Maharashtra’s Anti-Conversion Bill: Legislating suspicion in the name of “love jihad”

The post Draconian Law! appeared first on SabrangIndia.

– Poem by Amir Aziz

It is increasingly evident that Muslims in India are being robbed of their legitimate space and place within a nation that was once imagined as their collective constitutional dream. A vast majority chose to stay back in India after the 1947 bloody Partition, believing in existential roots, lived coexistence and constitutional equality. There have been riots and communal clashes in past decades post-Independence, but rarely was their very belonging to the nation so openly questioned and at grave risk. Rarely was their loyalty publicly doubted, their religion brazenly mocked.

It was uncommon for a sitting Chief Minister to pull a woman’s headscarf[1] simply because of her cultural choice, she donned a headscarf. It was unheard of for a Chief Minister to post violent and provocative imagery (video) depicting him shooting at Muslims[2]! What once manifested as communal ‘push and pull’ now appears to have been hardened and legitimised into something more systemic, an institutionalised propagation of directed othering, hatred and violence. 

CJP is dedicated to finding and bringing to light instances of Hate Speech, so that the persons propagating these venomous ideas can be unmasked and brought to justice. To learn more about our campaign against hate speech, please become a member. To support our initiatives, please donate now!

Accidental to Institutional

 This messaging is not confined to political speeches only. It is reinforced through ‘mainstream’ cinema; films marketed as if “based on real events,” filled with questionable, even repulsive and inflammatory depictions that amplify suspicion and hostility towards the Muslim. These narratives shape public imagination. In one disturbing instance, children living on the streets of South Mumbai were heard using hateful language against Muslims. When asked where such sentiments originated, they reportedly said that “aunts and uncles” take them to watch films, one of the few outings they can afford, as their parents earn meagre incomes selling roses on Marine Drive. Hatred, it seems, is being curated and consumed.

Policy, too, reflects this exclusion. Measures such as the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise—executed by the Election Commission of India (ECI) though this has been strongly legally contested—have clearly resulted in the disproportionate removal of Muslim names from electoral rolls, raising concerns about potential disenfranchisement. Legislative developments have added to these anxieties. Under the Citizenship (Amendment) Act 2019 (CAA), which came into force last year, members of specified persecuted minorities from neighbouring countries who entered India on or before 31 December 2014 were made eligible for Indian citizenship. Muslims were excluded from this framework. Not only has the Supreme Court of India kept the substantive legal challenges to this much criticised amendment (CAA 2019) in cold storage, the court will only now hear the batch of 250 petitions in early May 2026 (May 5-7, 2026).[3]

More recently, an order issued under the Immigration and Foreigners Act, 2025 extended relief to individuals particularly Hindus from Pakistan, who crossed into India after 2014, with officials stating that the cut-off has effectively been expanded by a decade due to the continued cross-border migration of persecuted minorities. This privileges one community over others in fast-tracked citizenship.

Taken together, these measures have intensified debate over whether citizenship policy is being recalibrated along religious lines, especially when viewed alongside voter roll revisions and public rhetoric framing Muslims as “infiltrators.”

‘Torching’ the lawn

Attempts by Hindutva affiliates to enter Masjids, incidents of mob lynching targeting Muslim vendors, mobs stopping individuals to demand proof of nationality, these have become disturbingly common. In Varanasi, “Operation Torch” was launched to identify so-called illegal migrants.

The forcible closure of Muslim-owned businesses under varying pretexts points toward the economic marginalisation of a community already made vulnerable. The cumulative effect suggests a systematic relegation of Muslims to second-class citizenship within their own country.

On the frontline of this targeting –in 2025-206 at least –are Bengali Muslim migrants—often daily wage labourers, domestic workers, and small vendors struggling for survival.

Direct Violence

“I am very poor, and my family is deeply worried about our future. Why did they beat me? I never forced anyone to buy my food.”

— Riyajul Sheikh, Food vendor from West Bengal

“I am a poor man. I earn a living for my family by selling utensils. After this incident, how will I go out and work?”

— Akmal Hussain, assaulted in Bihar in January 2026

On May 24, 2025, in Aligarh, four Muslim men Arbaz, Aqeel, Kadim, and Munna Khan, were brutally attacked by a mob of cow vigilantes over allegations of beef smuggling. The assailants set their vehicle on fire, blocked a highway, and assaulted them with sharp weapons, bricks, and sticks. One unconscious victim was seen being dragged from a police vehicle. This was reportedly the second attack on the same group at the same location within 15 days, suggesting targeted violence. A forensic report from a government laboratory in Mathura later confirmed that the meat was not beef, debunking the allegations. Police arrested four individuals under provisions of the Bhartiya Nyaya Sanhita for rioting, attempt to murder, extortion, and dacoity.

Riyajul (December 2025) was beaten by a mob and his goods were destroyed. He sells patties by walking through the streets of Kolkata. In one such incident from West Bengal, he was allegedly asked whether he had chicken patties in his box. When he replied in the affirmative, the assault began. When they heard his name, the violence intensified as reported by The Wire. It seems that, for many, the only fault is being Muslim. Such initiative feeds into a larger narrative of suspicion.

Source: Maktoob Media

Didar Hossain, a rickshaw puller from Agartala, was assaulted by a mob that attempted to burn him alive. He was robbed of his entire day’s earnings and severely beaten.

On December 22, in Basti, Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Singh, a leader of the Vishva Hindu Mahasangh, along with members of the group, harassed and threatened a Muslim chicken vendor for operating his shop near a temple. He described the butcher’s knives as “weapons” that could be used to kill people and threatened to file a police complaint for possessing them.

On December 30, in Madhubani, Bihar, approximately 40–50 Hindu nationalist supporters brutally assaulted and paraded a Muslim construction worker. He was falsely branded a Bangladeshi and forced to chant “Jai Shri Ram” and “Bharat Mata ki Jai.” The attackers allegedly threatened to sacrifice him at a Kali temple. Each incident may appear geographically scattered in Odisha, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Bihar, Tripura but the pattern is chillingly consistent.  The slogans are the same. The accusations are similar. The humiliation is public. The violence is performative. And the message is unmistakable: belonging is conditional.

On January 7, 2026, in Jharkhand, a 45-year-old Muslim man was killed by a mob after being accused of cattle theft.

On January 1, 2026, in Bhonkhera, Sikandrabad, Uttar Pradesh, threats were reportedly left inside the homes of Muslim residents in the region, creating an atmosphere of fear at the very threshold of their private spaces.

On January 14, 2026 in Sahada, Balasore, Odisha, cow vigilantes lynched Sheikh Makandar Mohammed, a 35-year-old Muslim helper on a pickup van. He was repeatedly forced to chant “Jai Shri Ram” and “Cow is my mother.” Police later took him to the hospital, where he succumbed to his injuries.

On January 22, 2026, a Bengali Muslim vendor from West Bengal was brutally beaten in Odisha by right-wing extremists who accused him of being a Bangladeshi infiltrator. A similar instance occurred the very next day, another Muslim vendor from Birbhum district, West Bengal, was allegedly forced to produce his Aadhaar card, made to chant religious slogans, and threatened with death if he did not leave Odisha.

Such attacks and atrocities have increasingly been framed as expressions of “patriotism.”

According to Akmal Hussain assaulted in Bihar, January 22 2026 (quoted above) the incident began when a woman showed interest in buying utensils and asked him to come near her home. When he arrived, a man confronted him, called him a Bangladeshi, and demanded identity documents. As he attempted to retrieve his phone, a crowd gathered and began assaulting him. He sustained injuries to his head, arms, and legs. Following the attack, he left the city and returned to his hometown in Hooghly, deeply traumatised.

These are not isolated events. There have been multiple incidents of Muslims being beaten to death and forced to chant slogans such as “Jai Shri Ram” and “Gai humari mata hai” before, during, or after being assaulted.

Institutions of prejudice

The University of Delhi found itself at the centre of controversy after its undergraduate admission form listed inappropriate caste-related entries in the “mother tongue” section. Instead of languages such as Urdu, Maithili, Bhojpuri and Magahi, the form reportedly included terms such as Cham***Mazdoor, Dehati, Mochi, Kurmi, Muslim and Bihari, as reported by The Wire and Hindustan Times.

The inclusion of “Muslim” as a language and the removal of Urdu triggered outrage on social media. Bengali was also allegedly absent. The episode raised concerns about institutional insensitivity and the normalisation of caste and religious stereotyping within academic processes.

Meanwhile, in Jammu and Kashmir, educational spaces became a communal flashpoint.

On January 6, hundreds of police and paramilitary personnel were deployed outside the Civil Secretariat in Jammu to prevent protests by a BJP-backed outfit opposing what it called a “biased” reservation system at the SMVD Institute of Medical Excellence in Reasi district.

The protest, led by the youth wing of the Shri Mata Vaishno Devi (SMVD) Sangharsh Samiti and supported by Hindu right-wing groups, centred on the admission of Muslim and other non-Hindu students. Protesters demanded cancellation of their admissions or closure of the college.

“The presence of non-Hindus on the campus and their style of eating and worship is bound to hurt the sentiments of Hindus… The government should cancel their admission or shut down the college,” a protester stated as reported by The Wire.

The agitation is expected to intensify ahead of the J&K Assembly’s winter session beginning February 2. Colonel Sukhvir Singh Mankotia announced a ‘Sanatan Jagran Yatra’, a hunger strike, a signature campaign, and demonstrations on January 8 and January 10, warning of a shutdown across the Jammu division.

The Chief Minister maintained that the college, established through an Act of the J&K Assembly, does not restrict admissions on religious grounds. However, BJP Leader of the Opposition Sunil Sharma stated that only students “who have faith in Mata Vaishno Devi” should be admitted.

All 50 students were admitted on the basis of NEET rankings. The controversy erupted after only eight Hindu students appeared in the first batch, with the remaining 42 being Muslims from the Kashmir Valley. The issue was allowed to take a sharply communal turn, with right-wing affiliates raising slogans demanding the expulsion of non-Hindu students. Following the outrage countrywide and also by the ruling party and opposition in Kashmir and Jammu, on January 26 this year, the Jammu and Kashmir Board of Professional Entrance Examination (BOPEE) was compelled to “adjust” these 50 excluded students in seven government-run medical colleges across J&K based on NEET-UG merit and their preferences. Read more here

At Jamia Millia Islamia, another controversy unfolded. On December 23, 2025 when the university suspended Professor Virendra Balaji Shahare of the Department of Social Work over a question in an end-semester examination paper titled Social Problems in India, set for BA (Honours) Social Work, Semester I, 2025–26. The query attempted a discussion on the plight of the Muslim minority in India (see below).

Source: The Wire

Algorithm for and by Hate

Elected officials, sitting in constitutional positions directing hate. This has been a singular feature of the past close to a dozen years and 2025 and early 2026 were no exception.

A video circulated by the Assam BJP in 2025 intensified concerns about the normalisation of dehumanising rhetoric in mainstream politics and even more specifically within law enforcement.

Source ; The Wire, X deleted video

The footage appeared to show Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma handling an air rifle, interspersed with AI-generated visuals depicting bullets striking images of men wearing skull caps and beards widely recognised as markers of Muslim identity. The clip portrayed Sarma as a Western-film hero, overlaid with the slogan “foreigner free Assam” and captioned “point blank shot.” Reports stated that Assamese text in the video included phrases such as “no mercy,” “Why did you not go to Pakistan?” and “There is no forgiveness to Bangladeshis.”

The imagery echoed Sarma’s earlier public remarks. On January 25, during a press conference, he declared: “Only ‘Miyas’ are evicted in Assam. Which Hindu has got notice? Which Assamese Muslim has got notice? We will do some utpaat [mischief], but within the ambit of law.” On January 27, he said: “This Special Revision is preliminary. When the SIR comes to Assam, four to five lakh Miya votes will have to be deleted in Assam.” A day later, he added: “Whoever can give trouble [to Miyas] should. If a rickshaw fare is Rs.5, give them Rs.4. Only if they face troubles will they leave Assam. Himanta Biswa Sarma and the BJP are directly against Miyas.” He has earlier stated that his job was to “make the Miya people suffer.”

Multiple petitions were subsequently filed before the Gauhati High Court seeking action against Sarma for alleged hate speeches targeting Muslims in the state. On Thursday, a Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Ashutosh Kumar and Justice Arun Dev Choudhury issued notices to the Chief Minister, the Central government and the Assam government. The matter is scheduled for hearing on April 21.

The petitions were filed by the Indian National Congress, Assamese scholar Hiren Gohain and the Communist Party of India (Marxist), after the Supreme Court advised them to approach the High Court. Senior advocates including Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Chander Uday Singh and Meenakshi Arora argued that Sarma’s remarks were provocative and threatening, particularly his references to the “miya” community , a term often used in Assam as a pejorative for Bengali-speaking or Bengali-origin Muslims, though the Chief Minister has described it as referring to “illegal immigrants.” The rhetoric has not been confined to one state.

BJP MLA Nitesh Rane posted a tweet on August 5, 2025 asking: if Hindus were being attacked in Bangladesh, why should Indians spare a single Bangladeshi in their country? He added that they would hunt down and kill every Bangladeshi living in India. The tweet was later deleted after controversy.

In January 2024, during the Ram Mandir Pran Pratishtha procession in Mira Road, Mumbai, amid communal tensions, Rane made a similar incendiary statement threatening to hunt down individuals. Hate speeches by senior BJP leaders, including Devendra Fadnavis and others, have also drawn criticism, with opposition parties and rights groups alleging a pattern of majoritarian mobilisation. Concerns have extended beyond the executive to the judiciary.

On December 8, 2024, a year before at a lecture on the Uniform Civil Code in Prayagraj organised by the Vishva Hindu Parishad, Justice Shekhar Kumar Yadav of the Allahabad High Court made remarks widely criticised as Islamophobic. Among other statements, he said: “My country is one where the cow, the Gita, and the Ganga form the culture, where every idol embodies Harbala Devi, and where every child is like Ram.” He added: “Here, from childhood, children are guided towards god, taught Vedic mantras, and told about non-violence. But in your culture, from a young age, children are exposed to the slaughter of animals. How can you expect them to be tolerant and compassionate?”

Justice Yadav also used the term ‘kathmullah’, a slur used against Muslims, and stated that “this country and law will function as per the wishes of the majority.” Lawyers’ bodies renewed calls for an in-house inquiry into his remarks.

Stark and questionable has it been that the higher constitutional courts have taken no action against Justice Yadav for this.

But what does the data reveal?

Parallel to this rhetoric, data-driven reports corroborate these patterns of violence.

In November 2025, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom released an India-specific issue update describing what it termed systemic religious persecution. The report cited the “interconnected relationship” between the Bharatiya Janata Party and the RSS, linking it to citizenship, anti-conversion and cow slaughter laws. It noted that hundreds of Christians and Muslims have been arrested under anti-conversion laws, with 70% of India’s inmates being pre-trial detainees and religious minorities disproportionately represented. In its 2025 Annual Report, USCIRF recommended that the U.S. Department of State designate India as a Country of Particular Concern, or CPC, for engaging in systematic, ongoing, and egregious religious freedom violations.

According to a CSSS report, released in early February 2026, mob violence against Muslims formed a significant category of harm in 2025. Fourteen lynching incidents were reported during the year, resulting in eight recorded deaths. These cases were often linked to allegations of cattle-related offences, suspicions of illegal immigration, and claims of “love jihad,” with some incidents reportedly involving forced religious slogans.

Among the cases cited were the killing of migrant worker Juel Sheikh in Sambalpur, Odisha; multiple lynching incidents in Bihar’s Nawada district; deaths linked to cattle theft accusations in Jharkhand; killings in Maharashtra, Haryana and Madhya Pradesh; an attack on a Muslim migrant in Kerala; and a case involving a student subjected to slurs in Dehradun. Reported by NDTV.

A separate analysis by India Hate Lab recorded 1,318 hate speech incidents in 2025, of which 98 per cent were stated to have targeted Muslims. These reportedly occurred at public rallies, religious gatherings, street events and across social media platforms. Human rights workers quoted in the study argued that such rhetoric had become routine, creating an atmosphere of insecurity despite constitutional guarantees of equal protection.

The CSSS report further raised concerns regarding uneven policing and prosecution, asserting that action appeared swifter in cases involving Hindu victims, while Muslims faced disproportionate arrests or police scrutiny. It also alleged that post-riot narratives sometimes attributed responsibility to Muslims without publicly available evidence.

The study concluded that the violence extended beyond physical attacks to what it described as heightened assertion of majoritarian cultural identity through religious symbols and festivals, alongside marginalisation of Muslim cultural expression. It stated that the cumulative effect was increased impunity for vigilante groups and a deepening sense of insecurity among Muslim citizens.

CSSS noted that its findings were based on monitoring national and regional publications including The Indian Express, The Hindu, The Times of India, Sahafat and Inquilab. Read more on this here.

Conclusion

In a recently released report by Human Rights Watch in February 2026, it was stated that,

“India’s slide to authoritarianism under the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – led government continued, with increased vilification of Muslims and government critics. Authorities illegally expelled hundreds of Bengali-speaking Muslims and Rohingya refugees to Bangladesh, some Indian citizens among them, claiming they were “illegal immigrants.” [page no. 215 ]

The demolition of homes belonging to poor, underpaid and hardworking people has become a recurring image of this moment. The victims, in most cases, are among the most economically vulnerable Muslim families. Hindu extremist groups, critics argue, have increasingly operated with overt or tacit support from segments of the government, administration and, in some instances, judicial authority, a development they attribute to the ideological leanings of the Modi government.

At the same time, India’s deepening political ties with Netanyahu’s Israel invoked here specifically as Netanyahu’s Israel to acknowledge that many Israelis oppose the policies of his regime are seen by some observers as reflective of a broader hardening of majoritarian statecraft.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has warned of a “well-thought-out conspiracy” to alter India’s population composition, referring to “these infiltrators.” Such language, when deployed by the country’s highest elected office, carries consequences. It reinforces the framing of a section of Indian citizens not as equal stakeholders in the republic, but as demographic threats.

When eviction drives, voter roll deletions, hate speeches, vigilante violence and institutional silences converge, they create not just isolated incidents but an atmosphere.

The question that inevitably arises is not only legal or political, but existential: What does it feel like to be a Muslim in Modi’s India?

For many, the answer lies in the steady normalisation of suspicion in the knowledge that citizenship can be questioned, belonging debated, and dignity negotiated.

And that, perhaps, is the deeper crisis beneath the data.

[During the research of this article an overwhelming number of incidents were found, it was difficult to cut down and mention a few. That in itself shows the horrendous state of minorities in our country.]

(The legal research team of CJP consists of lawyers and interns; this resource has been worked on by Natasha Darade)

[1] https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2025/12/india-chief-ministers-removal-of-womans-hijab-demands-unequivocal-condemnation/

[2] https://www.instagram.com/reel/DUiu9zZin8u/; https://scroll.in/latest/1090625/himanta-sarmas-shooting-at-muslims-video-left-parties-move-supreme-court

[3] https://www.scobserver.in/reports/citizenship-amendment-act-supreme-court-schedules-final-hearings-in-may-2026/; https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/supreme-court-to-hear-caa-petitions-from-may-5/article70651374.ece

Related

India Hate Lab Report 2025: How Hate Speech has been normalised in the public sphere | CJP

CJP 2025: a constitutional vanguard against hate and coercion during elections | SabrangIndia

The post Evicted, Accused, and Deleted: The shrinking space for Muslim citizenship appeared first on SabrangIndia.

A division bench of Justice Atul Sreedharan and Justice Siddharth Nandan directed that two armed guards be deployed 24 hours a day to protect Haseen Khan, the owner of the house where prayers were being offered. The Court further issued a strong warning that any incident of violence affecting Khan or his property would be presumed to have occurred at the instance of the State unless proven otherwise.

The order came while hearing a petition filed by Bareilly resident Tarik Khan, who approached the High Court alleging police interference with prayers held at a private residence in Mohammadganj village. The matter is now listed for final orders on March 23, and the Court has directed the District Magistrate and Senior Superintendent of Police of Bareilly to appear in person.

Allegations of police interference in private prayer

According to the petition, as per Livelaw, a group of Muslim residents had been offering namaz on the rooftop of a private house with the permission of the property owner, Haseen Khan. The petitioner claimed that on January 16, police personnel allegedly intervened and stopped the prayers, despite the fact that they were being conducted within private premises.

Khan further alleged before the Court that he was picked up from his home by police officials while offering namaz, challenged, and compelled to place his thumb impression on blank documents without being informed of their contents. He also told the Court that certain individuals had threatened demolition of his property if he did not testify in a particular manner.

These allegations prompted the filing of a contempt petition against the state authorities, arguing that the actions of the administration were in violation of an earlier High Court ruling that had affirmed the right to conduct prayer meetings on private property without state permission.

Court’s key observations

During the hearing, the Bench posed a direct query to the State regarding whether permission had been sought for offering namaz inside a private residence, according to LiveLaw.

The Additional Advocate General, Anoop Trivedi, appearing for the State, relied on the police challan and acknowledged that permission had indeed been sought from the persons present in the house, including the owner.

Taking note of the circumstances and the statement recorded from Haseen Khan in open court, the Bench issued strong protective directions.

The Court ordered:

“This Court directs that two armed guards 24/7 shall protect Haseen Khan till this Court decides otherwise. The said guards shall accompany him wherever he goes. Any incident of violence that afflicts Hassen Khan’s person or his property shall be prima facie understood to have at the instance of the State, which of course is open to rebuttal.”

It further observed that any act of violence directed against Khan or his property would be prima facie presumed to have occurred at the instance of the State, though the State would have the opportunity to rebut that presumption.

Personal appearance ordered for Bareilly officials

The Court has summoned Bareilly’s District Magistrate Avinash Singh and Senior Superintendent of Police Anurag Arya to appear before it on the next date of hearing.

In its order, the Bench warned that failure to appear could lead to coercive measures, including securing their presence through a non-bailable warrant.

The complete order may be read here.

Background: Earlier High Court ruling on private prayer

The controversy unfolds against the backdrop of an earlier ruling by the Allahabad High Court in a separate case involving Maranatha Full Gospel Ministries and Emmanuel Grace Charitable Trust.

In that January judgment, the Court held that no permission from the State is required to conduct religious prayers within private premises, since such activity falls within the scope of the fundamental right to freedom of religion under Article 25 of the Constitution.

However, the Court clarified that if religious activities spill onto public roads or public property, authorities may require intimation or permission under applicable law in order to maintain public order.

Ground reality in the village

Despite the High Court’s intervention, reports suggest that the situation on the ground remains tense.

According to reporting by The Times of India, residents of Mohammadganj village say that prayers inside private houses have not resumed, even after the contempt notice issued by the Court. Several villagers reportedly walk nearly two kilometres to offer namaz elsewhere, particularly during the month of Ramadan.

Local residents told the newspaper that although police harassment had reduced after the Court’s order, the presence of police personnel in the area continues and prayers within homes remain suspended due to fear of renewed tensions.

Some residents also alleged that individuals who were earlier detained for offering prayers had been required to report to the police station daily for several days, and that their names now remain in police records.

Origins of the dispute

The dispute reportedly began in December 2025, when construction materials were brought to a piece of land owned by Tarik Khan. Villagers suspected that the structure being built was intended to function as a mosque, triggering protests and police intervention.

Tarik Khan later filed an affidavit stating that the construction would not be used for religious purposes, but tensions persisted.

Subsequently, a group of Muslims began offering prayers inside a private house belonging to Haseen Khan, leading to the police action that has now become the subject of litigation.

Constitutional implications

The case raises broader questions about the scope of religious freedom under Article 25 of the Constitution, particularly the distinction between private religious activity and public religious assembly.

By ordering armed protection for the house owner and warning that any violence may be presumed to be state-instigated, the High Court’s interim directions underscore the seriousness with which it is treating allegations of state interference in constitutionally protected religious practice.

The matter will be taken up again on March 23, when the Court is expected to hear the personal submissions of the Bareilly district administration and consider final orders in the case.

Related:

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Bail for Monu Manesar, along with his grand welcome, rekindles fear and grief in Junaid–Nasir Lynching case

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According to the Hindustan Times, Manesar walked out of Sewar (Sevar) Central Jail in Bharatpur, Rajasthan, on the evening of March 8, 2026, after the Rajasthan High Court granted him regular bail earlier that week. He had spent approximately two-and-a-half years in judicial custody after being arrested in September 2023 in connection with the deaths of the two cousins whose charred bodies were discovered in Haryana’s Bhiwani district in February 2023.

His release was marked by a conspicuous public welcome. As provided by Indian Express, wearing a bulletproof vest and escorted by police, Manesar travelled by road from Bharatpur to his native village in Gurugram district, Haryana, where supporters greeted him with garlands, drum beats, and celebratory slogans. A large gathering of supporters—including individuals identified as cow vigilantes—had also assembled outside the jail during his release, prompting authorities to deploy additional police personnel to maintain law and order.

Background: The February 2023 killings

The case traces back to the night of February 14–15, 2023, when cousins Junaid (35) and Nasir (27), residents of the Pahadi area in Rajasthan’s Bharatpur region, went missing.

A day later, their charred bodies were discovered inside a burnt vehicle in Loharu in Bhiwani. The killings were widely suspected to be linked to vigilante groups who patrol highways in the region under the pretext of preventing illegal cattle transport.

According to police investigations, the victims were intercepted by cow vigilantes who suspected them of transporting cattle. However, investigators said that when the vigilantes allegedly found no cattle in the vehicle, the two men were assaulted and later killed.

Senior police officials later stated that interrogation of some accused indicated that Junaid died first after being assaulted in Ferozepur Jhirka. Nasir was allegedly strangled in Bhiwani before the attackers attempted to destroy evidence by dousing the vehicle and the bodies with petrol and setting them on fire, according to statements made by Bharatpur Range Inspector General Gaurav Srivastava during the investigation.

Forensic analysis later confirmed that the charred remains and blood stains recovered from the burnt SUV—later traced to a cowshed in Jind district—belonged to Junaid and Nasir.

Reports may be read here, here and here.

The criminal case and investigation

The criminal case was registered at the Gopalgarh Police Station based on a complaint filed by Khalid, a relative of the victims. The FIR named Manesar and several others as accused in the abduction and murder of the two men.

The case included charges under provisions of the Indian Penal Code relating to abduction, abduction with intent to cause grievous hurt, wrongful confinement, and related offences.

During the investigation, police announced a reward of ₹5,000 each for eight suspects and circulated their photographs publicly. Two suspects were subsequently arrested in May 2023 from Dehradun, as per Hindustan Times.

The case also became politically contentious in 2023. At the time, Manesar had gone absconding, triggering a public dispute between the then Congress-led Rajasthan government under Ashok Gehlot and the Haryana government led by Manohar Lal Khattar. Gehlot accused the Haryana Police of failing to cooperate in apprehending the accused, while Haryana authorities in turn registered a case against the Rajasthan Police over jurisdictional issues, as reported by The Indian Express.

Manesar was eventually detained by the Haryana Police in September 2023 in connection with communal violence in Nuh. He was subsequently handed over to Rajasthan Police, who arrested him in the Junaid–Nasir case.

The bail order

A Bench of Justice Anil Kumar Upman of the Rajasthan High Court granted bail to Manesar on March 5, 2026.

The court noted several factors while allowing the second bail application. Most prominently, it observed that despite more than two years having passed since the accused’s arrest, not a single witness out of the 74 prosecution witnesses had been examined during the trial, according to The Indian Express.

The judge also took note of the fact that a co-accused, Anil Kumar, had already been granted bail earlier by the Supreme Court of India on January 28, 2026.

Without commenting on the merits of the case, the court concluded that the prolonged incarceration and slow progress of the trial justified granting bail.

Manesar was directed to furnish a personal bond of ₹1 lakh along with two sureties of ₹50,000 each. The court imposed conditions requiring him to appear before the trial court whenever summoned and to mark his presence at the concerned police station once every three months until the trial concludes.

The order also warned that, given his criminal antecedents, he must not become involved in any other offence while on bail.

Defence and prosecution arguments

Manesar’s legal team, led by advocate Ashvin Garg and others, argued that he had been falsely implicated in the case. They contended that he stood on “better footing” than co-accused Anil Kumar, whom they described as the principal accused, while Manesar was alleged only to be part of a conspiracy, reported The Indian Express.

The defence also pointed out that he had been in custody since October 7, 2023, and had already spent more than two years and four months in jail without trial progress. They further submitted that although three criminal cases had previously been registered against him, he had been acquitted in two and granted bail in the third.

Opposing the plea, Public Prosecutor Vijay Singh and Senior Advocate Syed Shahid Hasan—appearing for the complainant—argued that the gravity of the alleged offences and the evidence collected during the investigation warranted continued detention.

Fear and despair among the victims’ families

The bail decision has deeply distressed the families of the two men killed in the incident.

Jameel Ahmed, a relative of Nasir, said the development had intensified their grief and created anxiety about the safety of witnesses.

“The families are disappointed and panicked with Monu Manesar’s bail. Our sorrow has increased. There is apprehension that they can do something untoward in the future and pressurise our witnesses. There is immense despair,” Ahmed told reporters of The Indian Express.

Family members of the victims have long maintained that Junaid and Nasir were kidnapped, assaulted, and murdered by members associated with the right-wing group Bajrang Dal—an allegation the organisation has denied.

A case that continues to test the justice system

Despite the bail order, the legal proceedings in the Junaid–Nasir case remain ongoing. However, the fact that none of the 74 prosecution witnesses have been examined even after more than two years has drawn attention to the chronic delays that often plague criminal trials in India—particularly in cases involving communal violence and vigilante attacks.

Related:

Monu Manesar, 20 others named in Bhiwani Double Murder: Rajasthan

The poster boy of cow vigilantism, Monu Manesar, is back

Monu Manesar not an accused in Junaid Nasir murder

Haryana Horror: Migrant worker lynched and teenager fatally shot amid rising violence

2024: Cow vigilantism escalates in July and August with rumour-driven raids and violent assaults on Muslim while legal consequences for perpetrators missing?

Anatomy of Violence in the Hitherto peaceful Nuh

Indian minorities must be protected, GOI needs to take steps: IAMC report

The post Bail for Monu Manesar, along with his grand welcome, rekindles fear and grief in Junaid–Nasir Lynching case appeared first on SabrangIndia.

An ASI survey in November 2024 on court orders had triggered a violent clash between locals and police in which four people died of bullet wounds. The court had been hearing a plea by Hindus claiming that the mosque was built by demolishing a Shiva temple during the rule of Mughal emperor Aurangzeb. There had been allegations that some of those accompanying the survey team were chanting “Jai Shri Ram”, nettling the area’s minority population.

Several people are still in jail in connection with the violence.

A commission appointed by the Sambhal district court had reportedly said in a report in 2024 that symbols associated with Hinduism had been found at Sambhal’s Shahi Jama Masjid, protected by the ASI since 1920.

Now, in an RTI application, Sambhal resident Satya Prakash Yadav had sought to know whether the Mughal-era mosque was built by demolishing any ruins or on vacant land, along with the name of the landowner at the time and the documents granting ownership rights.

The ASI, in its reply, stated that “no such information is available in this office”. On questions relating to the nature of constructions at the site at the time the mosque came under the ASI’s protection, any subsequent constructions, and past disputes associated with the shrine, the ASI said such information was not available in its records.

However, during the first appeal proceedings before the Central Information Commission, the ASI had said that although no new construction is permitted within a centrally protected monument, an “illegal” steel railing was being erected at the Jama Masjid site in 2018 and that the department had issued orders to stop the work.

The applicant had also asked about the period of construction of the mosque. The ASI replied that according to its records, “Jama Masjid Sambhal was constructed in the year 1526”, and referred to supporting material.

On whether the structure was known by any other name earlier, the department said the mosque has been protected by the ASI under the same name. In response to a query on the present nature of the structure, the ASI stated: “At present, it exists as a mosque.” It further said the Jama Masjid was taken under the protection of the ASI in 1920, citing a gazette notification.

During the hearing before the Central Information Commission, the appellant had argued that key information had been wrongly denied on the ground of non-availability. The ASI maintained that it had provided all information available on record and that it could not be compelled to create or collect information not maintained by it.

Upholding the ASI’s stand, the commission observed that the RTI Act obliges public authorities to disclose only existing records and does not require them to generate fresh information. It cited judicial precedents to underline that a public authority cannot be directed to furnish information not held by it.

Finding no grounds for further intervention, the commission dismissed the appeal, holding that the ASI’s replies — including its statement of having no records on whether the mosque was built over ruins or vacant land — were in accordance with the law.

Sabrangindia has consistently reported on the issue, and its reports may be read here, here and here.

According to Masjid Committee President Zafar Ali, the protest on November 24, 2024 was peaceful until CO Anuj Chaudhary responded to concerns with verbal abuse and an unprovoked lathi charge. The police, allegedly led by CO Anuj Chaudhary, responded with verbal abuse, a lathi charge, and then tear gas. As people began to flee, the police escalated, firing live ammunition. Tear gas followed, and then live rounds were fired. The crowd began to disperse, but police pursued them into lanes and homes. Eyewitnesses reported police using slurs, destroying property, and shooting indiscriminately.

Five Muslim men were killed, including a minor:

• Kamran (17), shot in the chest.
• Nasir, Abbas, Basim, and Nabeel—each with fatal injuries, many allegedly from police bullets.

Related:

Supreme Court blocks execution of Nagar Palika’s order regarding well near Sambhal Mosque, prioritises peace and harmony

Uttar Pradesh’s new tactics for harassment: Electricity theft charges, strategic revival of temple, opening up of 1978 Sambhal communal riots cases

Sambhal Mosque, Ajmer Dargah: how deep do we plunge into the abyss?

Sambhal Violence: State crackdown intensifies, thousands accused, and allegations of police misconduct ignite a political and communal crisis in Uttar Pradesh

Sambhal’s darkest hour: 5 dead, scores injured in Mosque survey violence as UP police face allegations of excessive force

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