The united Opposition has demanded that this Bill, along with two others (three far-reaching Bills) to be referred to the Standing Committees concerned. Spokesperson of the Indian National Congress (INC), Jairam Ramesh stated that, “We are hopeful that in keeping with the best of Parliamentary traditions and practices, this demand will be agreed to by the Government. The Bills require deep study and wide consultations. 1. Higher Education Commission Bill 2. Atomic Energy Bill 3. G-RAM-G Bill.” It is to be seen if the NDA’s outside allies, Chandrababu Naidu Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal United (JDU) join the Opposition in demanding that these proposes changes and shifts are first deliberated on, as required by a Parliamentary Committee.

Meanwhile, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) –that was had strongly participated in deliberations on the 2005 original MGNREGA apart from being part of the 2004-2009 UPA—has, in a public statement, strongly opposed the Union government’s move to introduce the Viksit Bharat – Guarantee for Rozgar and Ajeevika Mission (Gramin) Bill, 2025 (VB-GRAMG Bill), which seeks to replace the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). In a statement issued today, the left party stated that, “The proposed bill completely negates the basic character of the MNREGA, which is a universal demand driven law providing a limited right to work. It legally absolves the Union government from its responsibility to allocate funds according to the demand.”

Further the CPI-M states that, “The government’s claim of increasing guaranteed employment from 100 to 125 days is merely cosmetic. In reality, the Bill opens the door to the exclusion of large sections of rural households in the name of rationalisation of job cards. The provision allowing governments to suspend employment for up to 60 days during peak agricultural seasons will deny work to rural households when it is most needed and make them dependent on landlords. Mandating digital attendance at work place is bound to cause immense difficulties to workers, like loss of work, and denial of their rights.”

Another major concern is the proposed shift in the funding pattern. The Bill reduces the Centre’s responsibility for wage payments from 100 per cent to a 60:40 sharing arrangement for major states. By doing this, the proposed law shifts the responsibility of bearing the expenditure on unemployment allowance and delay compensation from the Union to the states. In doing so, this places an unsustainable financial burden on state governments while denying them any role in the decision making process. The introduction of “normative allocation” – with state-wise expenditure ceilings imposed by the Centre and excess costs borne by states – will further curtail the programme’s reach and dilute the Centre’s accountability, states the CPI-M. Hence the party has also demanded a) that the VB-GRAMG Bill be withdrawn immediately and b) The Union government must instead engage in consultations with political parties, trade unions and organisations of the rural poor to strengthen MGNREGA and ensure its effective implementation as a universal and rights-based employment guarantee.

Meanwhile, John Brittas, a Parliamentarian in the Rajya Sabha representing the CPI-M has also provided a detailed critique of the new proposed law on social media, “X”. He states that the “Modi 3.0 government has removed the soul of a rights-based guarantee law and replaced it with a conditional, centrally controlled scheme stacked against States & workers.

“125 days” is the headline. 60:40 is the fine print – MGNREGA was a fully centrally funded one for unskilled wages; G RAM G downgrades it with States to bear 40%. States will now have to shell out around Rs. 50,000+ crore. Kerala alone will have to bear an additional 2,000–2,500 crore.  Cost shifting by stealth, not reform. This is the new federalism: States pay more; Centre walks away, yet claims the credit.

“MGNREGA was demand-driven: if a worker asked for work, the Centre had to pay – G RAM G replaces this with Centre’s pre-fixed normative allocations & ceilings. When funds run out, rights run out. A legal employment guarantee is reduced to a centrally managed publicity scheme at the expense of States.

“Panchayats have been side-lined, (digital) dashboards empowered – MGNREGA trusted Gram Sabhas & Panchayats to plan works based on local needs – G RAM G mandates GIS tools, PM Gati Shakti layers & central digital stacks. Local priorities are filtered through a Viksit Bharat National Rural Infrastructure Stack. It makes biometrics, geo-tagging, dashboards and AI audits statutory. For millions of rural workers, tech failures mean exclusion without appeal. “

Therefore, he says,

“Decentralisation replaced by centralised templates; People (have) become data points.

“Worse, G RAM G mandates suspension of work for up to 60 days every year in the name of agricultural seasons. Employment guarantee or labour control? Scheme labourers are legally told: Don’t work. Don’t earn. Wait. Stopping public works to push labour into private farms is not welfare – it is state-managed labour supply, stripping workers of wages, choice and dignity. “

He concludes by adding that,

“G RAM G stands for central control, State funds & conditional rights. Same workers. Less rights. More burden. This Bill doesn’t reform MGNREGA – it dismantles it fiscally, institutionally and morally.

“Bottom line: In the name of RAM, the States and poor are penalised, short-changed and fiscally sacrificed.”

Detailing the new 2025 Bill further, John Brittas says,

“Under Section 10 of the MGNREG Act, 2005, the ‘Central Employment Guarantee Council’ ‘ was statutorily bound to uphold social representation, mandating that not less than one-third of its non-official members shall be women and not less than one-third belonging to the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes and Minorities. Yet, the corresponding rechristened ‘Central Gramin Rozgar Guarantee Council’ under Clause 12 of the G RAM G Bill conspicuously and deliberately omits these reservation requirements.

“In contrast, Clause 13 of the G RAM G Bill, governing the rechristened ‘State Gramin Rozgar Guarantee Councils’, explicitly retains the very same representation criteria for women, and for SCs, STs, OBCs and Minorities, exactly as provided in Section 12 of MGNREGA for the ‘State Employment Guarantee Councils’.

“This selective retention leaves no room for benign explanation. It clearly establishes that the omission at the Central level cannot be dismissed as an oversight or drafting error, but represents a conscious dilution of statutory social inclusion at the apex level. This follows a familiar pattern – much like the Union Government’s 2023 attempt to dilute mandatory SC/ST allocations under the revised MPLADS Guidelines, which was constrained to be rolled back after I (John Brittas) raised formal objections with the Minister – demonstrating that such exclusions are neither accidental nor unprecedented, but deliberate policy choices until challenged.”

Clearly rights based legislation is being diluted and rural work has been made more conditional and fragile. MGNREGA 2025 that revived rural economies, prevented migration, kick-started a demand based economic cycle is being formally throttled by a new law that will seek to control and not disburse and de-centralise economic growth and resources.

It is to be seen if the NDA’s outside allies, Chandrababu Naidu Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal United (JDU) join the Opposition in demanding that these proposes changes and shifts are first deliberated on, as required by a Parliamentary Committee.

Related:

MNREGA facing fund crunch despite highest ever budgetary allocation

CJP submits detailed feedback to Labour Ministry on Draft Shram Shakti Niti 2025

Jharkhand BJP leader gets ration from Antyodaya, claims being MNREGA labour, while Savitri starves to death after being denied Antyodaya card

The post MNREGA to G RAM G: Ideological shift, erosion of rural workers’ rights, increase of fiscal burden on states appeared first on SabrangIndia.

A decade-long livelihood cut short

Hussain, originally from Gagandiwan village under Laheri police station in Biharsharif, had earned his livelihood for nearly 20 years by selling clothes door-to-door in rural Nawada on a bicycle, according to Indian Express. Over the past few years, he had been living with his in-laws in Barui village, Nawada district, from where he would travel daily to surrounding villages to sell garments.

Family members described him as a quiet worker who had never faced complaints or conflict in the course of his business, as per The New Indian Express.

Night of December 5: From seeking help to being hunted

On the night of December 5, Hussain was returning from Dumri village after a day of hawking when his bicycle reportedly developed a puncture. Near Bhattapar (also referred to as Bhatta) village, which falls under Roh police station, he stopped to ask locals about a puncture repair shop, as reported by Indian Express.

According to his brother Mohammad Shakib Alam, instead of helping him, a group of villagers questioned him about his name and profession, reported Scroll. Soon after identifying him, they allegedly dragged him off his bicycle and began assaulting him.

Robbery and illegal confinement

Hussain told investigators and media, in a video recorded from his hospital bed, that the attackers robbed him of cash—variously reported as Rs 8,000 and Rs 18,000—along with his bicycle and clothes (ThePrint).

He was then tied by his hands and feet and locked inside a room, where the violence intensified over several hours. What began with a smaller group of assailants reportedly expanded as more villagers joined, eventually forming a mob of 15–20 people.

Extreme and prolonged torture

The assault, as described by Hussain and later corroborated in parts by medical findings, involved sustained and sadistic violence. He stated that he was beaten repeatedly with bricks and iron rods, resulting in fractured fingers and hands, provided Indian Express.

In one of the most chilling aspects of the case, Hussain alleged that the mob stripped him to check his private parts to confirm his religion, after which the assault escalated further, as per ThePrint. He said petrol was poured on him, and his body was branded with a heated iron rod, causing severe burns that peeled his skin.

Hussain also alleged that his ears and fingertips were cut with pliers, his nails were pulled out, and a steel rod was used to strike his head, causing serious head injuries.

At one point, according to his statement, one attacker climbed onto his chest and attempted to strangle him, leading to blood gushing from his mouth. The assault reportedly continued intermittently through the night as more assailants arrived.

Police intervention after hours of violence

An emergency Dial 112 call was eventually made, following which Roh police reached the village at around 2:30 a.m. on December 6, several hours after the assault began, as reported by Indian Express.

Furthermore, police sources told The Indian Express that Hussain was found in a grievously injured condition. He was taken first to the Roh Primary Health Centre, then referred to Nawada Sadar Hospital, and later shifted to Vardhman Institute of Medical Sciences (VIMS), Pawapuri, as his condition worsened.

Despite medical intervention, Hussain remained critical. He ultimately died nearly a week later while being transported from Pawapuri to Patna for advanced care.

Victim’s statement before death

Crucially, Hussain managed to give a video statement from his hospital bed, accessed by ThePrint. In the recording, he named the acts of torture inflicted upon him and explicitly stated that he was targeted after the assailants identified him as Muslim.

While some senior police officials later claimed that the religious aspect did not appear in the wife’s initial written complaint, the existence of Hussain’s recorded statement has become a key piece of evidence in the ongoing investigation.

FIR by wife: Allegations of false theft and mob violence

On December 6, Hussain’s wife Shabnam Parveen filed a detailed complaint naming 10 residents of Bhattapar village and 15 unidentified persons, reported Indian Express. She alleged that her husband was falsely accused of theft, tied up, robbed, and brutally tortured.

She also stated that when she and her relatives reached Bhattapar to look for Hussain, they were abused and threatened by villagers, prompting the police to add further sections relating to intimidation and criminal force.

Based on her complaint, police registered an FIR invoking multiple provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, including sections dealing with unlawful assembly, rioting, grievous hurt using dangerous weapons, abetment, common intention, and group violence motivated by discrimination. After Hussain’s death, Section 103 (murder) was added, as per The New Indian Express.

Counter-FIR against the injured victim

Within hours of the assault coming to light, a cross-complaint was filed by Sikandar Yadav, one of the men later named as an accused by Parveen. Yadav alleged that Hussain had committed theft at his house that night, claiming the loss of jewellery and utensils (ThePrint).

Based on this complaint, police initially booked the severely injured Hussain under sections of the BNS relating to theft and trespass, even as he lay hospitalised. Senior police officials later stated that both FIRs are being investigated simultaneously, a pattern that has drawn criticism from rights groups for effectively placing the victim and perpetrators on the same legal footing.

Arrests, official stance, and denial of lynching

Nawada Superintendent of Police Abhinav Dhiman confirmed that a Special Investigation Team was constituted, which arrested four suspects within 24 hours, followed by further arrests over the next few days.

As of the latest reports of Indian Express, eight to nine persons have been arrested or detained, including several named in the FIR, while police continue raids to trace the remaining accused,

Despite the nature of the allegations, some senior officials initially denied that the case amounted to a religion-based lynching, describing it instead as an assault arising out of “mistaken identity” linked to theft suspicions, according to The Print. This position stands in contrast to the victim’s recorded account and the brutality documented in medical examinations.

Family left devastated

Hussain, described by his family as the sole breadwinner, is survived by his wife and three children. His brother told The Print that the family has suffered an irreversible loss and now faces an uncertain future.

As the investigation continues, the case has become emblematic of mob violence enabled by rumours, identity checks, and delayed state intervention, raising urgent questions about accountability, police conduct, and the protection of vulnerable livelihoods in India.

Related:

Babri Masjid’ v/s Gita recital: In a cynical play of communal politics, pre-poll West Bengal sees active polarisation at both ends of the spectrum

NBDSA Raps Times Now Navbharat for communal, agenda-driven broadcast; orders removal of inflammatory segments

Silent Scars: How Muslim widows of hate crimes endure layered, unseen oppression

CJP Files complaint with NCM over escalating Hate Speeches during Hindu Sanatan Ekta Padyatra

Hindu Nationalism’s sectarian nationalism and its concept of ‘duties and rights’

The post Muslim clothes hawker dies after prolonged mob torture in Bihar’s Nawada appeared first on SabrangIndia.

“This fight is between ‘satya’ and ‘asatya’ [truth and untruth]. We will stand behind ‘satya’ and will remove [Prime Minister] Narendra Modi, [Home Minister] Amit Shah and the RSS government from the country. They have ‘satta’ [power] and they indulge in ‘vote chori’,” Mr. Gandhi said. Gandhi quoted from and lambasted Mohan Bhagwat, chief of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), “The world respects not the truth but the powerful, display and manifestation of power alone” Bhagwat had been recently speaking at the Virat Hindu Maha Sammelan at the Andamans! 

Rahul Gandhi also repeated the sham voters and bogus voter’s lists issued exposed by him and the INC in the Haryana state elections in 2024.

Sabrangindia had, on November 5, 2025 reported on Rahul Gandhi’s exposure on how in the 2024 Haryana elections “One in eight voters fake” According to Gandhi, Haryana, with roughly two crore registered voters, had about 25.4 lakh bogus entries — meaning “one in every eight voters is fake.”

He said his team had classified the fake voters under five categories:

• 5.2 lakh duplicate voters,
• 93,174 invalid addresses,
• 19.2 lakh bulk voters (20 or more voters registered at the same address), and
• Several others linked to misuse of Form 6 (additions) and Form 7 (deletions).

“Despite clear technical capacity to detect duplicates, the ECI deliberately refused to run even a basic photo-identity matching query,” Gandhi alleged. “Why? Because they are helping the BJP.”

The ‘Brazilian Model’ case and recycled photos

Displaying a presentation with screenshots from the official voter database, Gandhi held up a photo of a woman he said is a Brazilian model, alleging that her image was used to create 22 separate voter IDs across 10 polling booths in Haryana. “What is a Brazilian woman doing on a voters’ list in Haryana?” he asked.

He further claimed that in some cases, the same photograph appeared 223 times across different constituencies. “This is just one example. There are thousands more. This is not voter error — this is organised fraud,” he asserted.

The Congress leader ridiculed Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar’s explanation that voter IDs bearing “House No. 0” are reserved for homeless citizens. “We physically went to those addresses,” Gandhi said, showing a two-storey house listed as ‘House No. 0’. “This is not homelessness. This is hiding. The CEC is lying to the people of India.” In one instance, Gandhi said, 501 voters were registered under a single address, calling it “statistical proof of systematic rigging.”

“Industrialised vote theft”: Rahul Gandhi

In his major third time exposure on November 5, Rahul Gandhi had termed the manipulation “industrialised”, Gandhi said the same centralised pattern was visible in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh, adding that the Congress had first detected the scam in Mahadevapura and Aland Assembly constituencies in Karnataka. “In Aland, fake login IDs and mobile numbers were used to delete voters remotely. In Mahadevapura, over one lakh names were found to be either deleted or duplicated. We saw the same pattern in Haryana — that’s when we realised this is national-scale rigging,” Gandhi said.

He added that the same strategy was now being deployed in Bihar (October 2025 Vidhan Sabha elections), where 47 lakh names were deleted during the recent voter list revision. Several affected voters from Bihar’s Jamui district joined Gandhi on stage, claiming their names were removed without notice.

“Thousands of BJP Voters in Two States”

Gandhi also claimed that thousands of BJP leaders and workers were registered in multiple states. “They are voting in both Uttar Pradesh and Haryana,” he said, citing examples of party office-bearers with dual entries.

To underline this, he played a video of BJP Kerala Vice President B. Gopalakrishnan, who had in August openly stated that his party would “bring voters from other states and settle them for a year to ensure victory.”

INC’s show of strength at Ramlila Maidan

The grand only party also showcased nearly six crore signatures it gathered as part of its campaign against vote chori and these would be submitted to the President. The portrayed a figure representing Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, showing him in chains, while alleging electoral irregularities.

Addressing the ‘Vote Chor, Gaddi Chhod’ rally, Mr. Kharge said the ideology of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief Mohan Bhagwat or RSS founder M.S. Golwalkar and Manusmriti would destroy the country, and only the ideology of the Congress could save it. He accused the BJP-RSS of trying to “finish off the Constitution and enslave the poor in the name of Hindutva”.

“These [BJP] people are ‘gaddars’, you will have to remove these gaddars. If you want to protect yourself, remove these gaddars. For that purpose, Rahul Gandhi walked throughout the country. BJP people are ‘dramebaaz’, they only believe in their own propaganda,” the Congress chief said.

Lakhs of Congresspersons arrive at Ram Lila Maidan, massive turnout

A massive turnout of Congress workers from across the country marked the party’s mega rally against alleged “vote chori”, with chants of “vote chor, gaddi chhod” echoing across the venue. Congress Parliamentary Party chairperson Sonia Gandhi, several senior party leaders, and the Chief Ministers of Karnataka, Telangana and Himachal Pradesh — Siddaramaiah, Revanth Reddy and Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu — were present at the rally.

Addressing the gathering, Mr. Gandhi named Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi, alleging that they were working in favour of the BJP and standing with untruth.

The Lok Sabha Opposition leader alleged that “vote chori” was not merely theft of votes but an attack on Dr. B.R. Ambedkar’s Constitution. “Had they not been indulging in vote chori, you would have removed them from power in five minutes. Like truth is in your DNA, there is untruth and vote chori in their DNA,” he said to loud applause.

Warns of action

Informing the audience on an issue that he has raised several times these past months and year, Rahul Gandhi recalled how Prime Minister Narendra Modi brought a new law granting “immunity” to the Election Commission, Mr. Gandhi warned, “We are telling you [election commissioners] clearly that this law is to protect you and we will change this law retroactively and will take strict action against you.”  He also claimed that the Prime Minister had lost confidence after the alleged vote theft was exposed, adding that Mr. Shah’s “hand was trembling” in Parliament.

“Amit Shah is brave only as long as he holds power. The day power is gone, his bravery will also vanish on that very day,” the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha said.

Mr. Kharge asserted that only the Congress’s ideology could “save the country”. “The seeds being sown by the RSS-BJP are very dangerous,” he said, adding that the Congress’s fight was against the RSS-BJP and those indulging in vote theft.

Referring to Mr. Modi’s victory claims, Mr. Kharge remarked, “We lost at many places, but still our party and our ideology are alive. If Modi loses once, there will be no trace of him after that,” and urged people to strengthen the Congress’s struggle for the people.

The Congress chief also questioned the Prime Minister’s foreign visits during parliamentary sessions.

Congress MP Saptagiri Ulka said that the party will continue to fight against the SIR and “vote chori” from the House to the streets.

“We had forced the government to discuss it; this is a big issue… Our main problem is that through this SIR, an attempt is being made to remove the poor, backward, Dalit, and traditional voters of Congress and the INDIA alliance from the elections to gain an advantage; therefore, we are holding this rally against it,” Ulka said.

Related:

No vote can be deleted online by the public, ECI refutes Rahul Gandhi’s claim but refusal to share data raises doubts

“Vote Chori Factory”: Rahul Gandhi accuses ECI of protecting electoral fraud, demands action in 7 days

Rahul Gandhi alleges ‘Vote Chori’ in 2024 polls, accuses BJP-ECI nexus of systematic electoral fraud

‘Election Commission involved in vote theft’: Rahul Gandhi repeats charge, now drops ‘atom bomb’ ahead of Bihar poll, also says ‘won’t spare you’

The post Ensure free & fair elections, Congress warns Election Commissioners, threatens strict action over ‘vote theft’ at a massive show of strength at Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The interesting part was that in the front of the processions were bullock carts in keeping with the tradition , unlike some other processions where they use mechanized vehicles. This makes our streets so lively, of course mostly we have bad traffic jams and things are bad. But these old traditions lend much colour to the otherwise drab lives of common people. In the West they have given up these traditions long ago, the streets are too sanitized, too orderly.

A Sandal Procession (Sandal Sharif) is a Sufi Islamic ritual where devotees carry fragrant sandalwood (Sandal/Chandan) paste in plates, often with incense, to anoint the tombs (dargahs) or walls of mosques belonging to Muslim saints during Urs (death anniversary) celebrations. It is a display of devotion, purity, and unity, sometimes integrated with local traditions, there is Hindu Muslim unity, the Mahim police station takes the lead in the organization.

Some people may scoff at the idea animals on the streets which they think should be reserved for their cars, forgetting that motor cars are big polluters and impose such heavy social costs.

With all the faults, traditionally Indians have a good relationship with domestic animals, on some days the bullocks are worshipped decorated, not burdened on the day of Pola in Maharashtra and there are similar days in other states.

Westerners with all their sophistication in certain matters had had a pretty unfriendly, even hostile relationship with animals like in bull fighting which involve so much violence and though horse racing appeals to so many people, it involves much cruelty to the animal which we never get to see.

As coincidence would have it I saw a fairly interesting film at Alliance Francaise earlier this week which showed a woman, the protagonist, who realizes the need to treat the bulls kindly in bull sports.

In the film Animal, the first local woman to enter the ring with the young men who tempt, chase and are chased by local bulls starts to see things from the bulls’ perspective as bulls go “rogue” and started goring and stamping the locals in the dark of night, long after the audience — mostly tourists — for some events has left.

The Camargue style of bullfighting is non-fatal, a lot less bloody and far and away a more humane and “even” contest and is thus referred to as “bull racing” by the locals, who enter the ring — basically unarmed and on foot — and try to snatch cash-prize tokens attached to the bull’s scalp.
But as experts point every year, approximately 180,000 bulls are killed in bullfights around the world, with many more killed or injured in bull fiesta events. Bullfighting is already banned by law in many countries including Argentina, Canada, Colombia, Cuba, Denmark, Italy and the United Kingdom.
Although legal in Spain, some Spanish cities, have outlawed the practice of bull fighting.

(From Vidyadhar Date’s page on Facebook)

Mahim Durgah, a Sufi Saint and a Mumbai police ritual

A colonial practice, this ritual of Mumbai’s top police officers walking to durgahs with an offering every year has continued –despite the serious fissures between the police administration and Mumbai’s (then Bombay’s Muslim minority) during the post-Babri Masjid demolitions in December 1992 and January 1993. Sections of an otherwise acclaimed police force were accused, and found by the Justice BN Srikrishna Commission of being guilty of deep anti-minority biases. The practice of officers offering the ceremonial chadar has continued and this year. Each year, as Urs begins at Mahim Dargah, in December, a scene plays out on the streets of Mumbai with a police band at the front, uniformed officers behind and senior police officers carrying a green chadar as they walk towards the 600-year-old shrine of Hazrat Makhdoom Ali Mahimi.

After Independence, while most government departments quietly shed the ceremonial and religious practices they had inherited from the British era a few exceptions endured, particularly at dargahs such as Mahim, and Dongri’s Rehman Shah Ba.

What is the legacy of the Mahim Dargah?

The Indian Express reports that the Mahim Dargah of Hazrat Makhdoom Ali Mahimi is one of Mumbai’s oldest and most historically revered Islamic shrines, with a lineage going back over 600 years. Long before Mumbai grew into a metropolis, this coastal dargah functioned as a spiritual anchor for sailors, traders, scholars and communities along the western coast. The saint himself was of Arab descent; his ancestors are believed to have arrived in India around AD 860 (AH 252) after fleeing the persecution of Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, the much-feared governor of Basra. Born roughly five centuries later in India, Makhdoom Ali Mahimi received rigorous training in Islamic law and theology and was eventually appointed the faqih, or law officer, for the Muslim community of Mahim. He passed away in 1431, and soon after his death, the local community built a mosque and shrine in his honour. Over the centuries, that shrine evolved into one of Mumbai’s most significant pilgrimage centres.

Related:

Preamble to be read at Mahim Dargah in Mumbai

A Mahim Dargah revered by Mumbai Police

The post Mian Maqdoom Shah shrine, Mumbai’s Mahim Durgah & the December Urs appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The Supreme Court also directed a special court to conduct trial on a day-to-day basis to record the statements of the nine remaining witnesses. Langa has been ordered to extend full cooperation with the proceedings and seek no adjournment on the ground that his petition seeking the case be quashed is pending. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has been directed to file a status report on compliance with these directions. The matter has been listed for further consideration on January 6.

Langa had been arrested by the Gujarat Police last year in a case involving allegations of Goods and Services Tax (GST) fraud and was subsequently booked in multiple cases. The ED later registered a case against him under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). It was senior advocate Kapil Sibal appeared for Langa. Opposing the plea, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta alleged that Langa had extorted money, claiming that threats were made to publish adverse material if payments were not made. “A journalist is found to be extorting money… We want to file an additional counter,” Mehta told the court.

Sibal objected to the move, stating that the ED was seeking to change its stand. He argued that allegations of “Rs 68-crore fraud” were exaggerated, asserting that “it is not even Rs 68 lakh.” Sibal further pointed out that no charge sheet had been filed in the predicate offence forming the basis of the PMLA case. “I have been in custody since October 2024. For what offence? It is not murder,” he submitted, calling allegations of influencing witnesses “shocking”.

Sibal also alleged that crucial documents had not been furnished to the defence, stating that there was no supplementary complaint and that the prosecution could not “have it both ways”. Finally after heated exchanges in court and taking note of the fact that only nine witnesses remain to be examined, the court granted interim bail. During a brief exchange after the order, Mehta reiterated the allegation of extortion, to which Sibal responded by suggesting that industrialists were targeting journalists. Mehta denied any political motive, stating that the prosecution was acting purely in a professional capacity. When the exchange escalated, the CJI intervened, stressing that the trial must not be delayed and cautioning Langa against misusing his position as a journalist. Sibal responded that any such violation would be grounds for cancellation of bail.

The Gujarat high court had denied bail to Langa following which he had approached the Supreme Court.

Related:

“This system breaks the body when it cannot break the spirit” — Ipsa Shatakshi on her jailed husband, journalist Rupesh Kumar Singh

One more attack on the Media: Local journalist thrashed and urinated upon by railway police, UP

SC’s denial of bail to journalist Rupesh Singh once again showcases how the Court looks at bail under UAPA, with varying consistency

The post Interim bail to Gujarat journalist Mahesh Langa: SC appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The Guardian reported the New South Wales Police stating the attack happened as hundreds gathered to mark the first day of Hanukkah and has been declared a terrorist incident. The victims include an Israeli citizen, according to Israel’s foreign ministry. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the national security committee was convened urgently following the attack. The attack occurred around 6:45 pm local time at Bondi Beach during a Hanukkah celebration attended by around 1,000 people.

“There has been a devastating terrorist incident at Bondi at the Hanukkah by the sea celebration. This is a targeted attack on Jewish Australians on the first day of Hanukkah, which should be a day of joy, a celebration of faith, an act of evil, anti-Semitism, terrorism that has struck the heart of our nation,” he said.

“An attack on Jewish Australians is an attack on every Australian and every Australian. There is no place for this hate, violence and terrorism in our nation. Let me be clear we will eradicate it,” he added.

A bystander fruit-seller emerges international hero

A bystander seen in a widely circulated video disarming a gunman during a deadly shooting rampage at a popular Australian beach has been widely heralded as a hero who saved lives. CCTV Video footage posted on social media shows a burly passer-by clad in a white T-shirt and dark pants crouching behind a parked car before sneaking up behind a gunman, grabbing him and wrestling away his firearm. The bystander then points the weapon at the gunman, who falls to the ground.

Identified by 7News as 43 year-old Ahmed al-Ahmed, a bystander fruit-seller, he suffered two bullet injuries from one of the terror attackers; he is the father of two and owner of a fruit shop in Sydney.

This extraordinarily brave act has drawn wide praise and acclaim including from religious political leaders alike. What is crucial is that the Australian media and international media have played up this heroic intervention that came from a resident Muslim. Central Synagogue rabbi Levi Wolff reported The Guardian said he is ‘grateful’ for those who aided victims of Sunday’s Bondi beach shooting attack, including a bystander who wrestled a firearm off one of the alleged gunmen. Praised as a hero, he is being identified by some media as a 43-year-old fruit shop owner from the Sutherland Shire. He suffered two bullet wounds, in his arm and in his hand, one of his relatives told Seven News outside a hospital. This brave intervention drew wide praise, including from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. New South Wales Premier Chris Minns called it the “most unbelievable scene.” “A man walking up to a gunman who had fired on the community and single-handedly disarming him, putting his own life at risk to save the lives of countless other people,” Minns said. “That man is a genuine hero.”

Speaking from the White House on Sunday, even US President Donald Trump called Ahmed a “very, very brave person” who “saved a lot of lives.” Trump offered “great respect to that man that did that.”

Extraordinary courage from Ahmed El Ahmad, a Muslim, 43-year-old father of two, who bravely risked his life to save his neighbors celebrating Hanukkah.
Praying for his full & speedy recovery.

And so deeply inspired by his example. pic.twitter.com/HTeLRTlbFV

— Brad Lander (@bradlander) December 14, 2025

Unlike international media, Indian national media, including newspapers played up the gun attack on Bondi Beach; Only NDTV and the Week carried mention of the citizen hero, fruit-seller!

From the Bloody Scene at Bondi Beach

Arsen Ostrovsky, a lawyer attending the Hanukkah ceremony with his wife and daughters, was grazed in the head by a bullet. Ostrovsky told the media that he had moved from Israel to Australia two weeks ago to work for a Jewish advocacy group.

“What I saw today was pure evil, just an absolute bloodbath. Bodies strewn everywhere,” he told The Associated Press in an email from the hospital. “I never thought would be possible here in Australia.”

Lachlan Moran, 32, from Melbourne, told the AP he was waiting for his family when he heard shots. “I sprinted as quickly as I could,” Moran said. He said he heard shooting off and on for about five minutes. “Everyone just dropped all their possessions and everything and were running and people were crying and it was just horrible.”

Anti-semitic attacks have risen in Australia

Albanese vowed the violence would be met with “a moment of national unity where Australians across the board will embrace their fellow Australians of Jewish faith.” Some of his political opponents and Israel’s government accused him of not having done enough to prevent such a horror.

Australia, a country of 28 million people, is home to about 117,000 Jews, according to official figures. Antisemitic incidents, including assaults, vandalism, threats and intimidation, surged more than threefold in the country during the year after Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, and Israel launched a war on Hamas in Gaza in response, the government’s Special Envoy to Combat Antisemitism Jillian Segal reported in July.

Father and son duo alleged to be behind shooting using licensed firearms

Naveed Akram previously known to security agencies, prime minister says. His gun-owning father, Sajid, was shot dead by police at the scene said The Guardian adding that the alleged gunmen behind Sydney’ Bondi beach attack are a father-son duo suspected of using legally obtained firearms to commit the massacre, according to police.

Naveed Akram, 24, was nabbed at the scene itself and taken to a Sydney hospital with critical injuries. His 50-year-old father, who the Sydney Morning Herald first reported to be Sajid Akram, was shot dead by police. The two allegedly killed 15 people, with dozens more injured in the shootings which took place on Sunday, during a gathering to celebrate the first night of Hanukah.

According to reports, the son was known to New South Wales police and security agencies, while his father had a firearms licence with six weapons registered to him. All six firearms have been recovered, police said. Four of these weapons, long arms believed to include a rifle and shotgun, were seized at the scene in Bondi, with other weapons also found during a police raid at a house in Campsie, in Sydney’s south-west. As per a report in The Guardian.

Reportedly, Naveed Akram, who worked as a bricklayer, came under the attention of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (Asio) in October 2019, according to the prime minister, Anthony Albanese. He was examined for six months because of his alleged associations with others, with the ABC reporting claims that the counter-terror investigation involved an Islamic State cell. “[Naveed Akram] was examined on the basis of being associated with others and the assessment was made that there was no indication of any ongoing threat or threat of him engaging in violence,” Albanese said. Sajid had held a Category AB firearm licence, police said. This is a licence which requires a person to demonstrate to police they have a “special need” for certain weapons, which can include muzzle-loading firearms (other than pistols); centre-fire rifles (other than self-loading); and shotgun/centre-fire rifle combinations.

The home affairs minister, Tony Burke, said Naveed is an Australian-born citizen. His father had arrived in Australia on a student visa in 1998, transferred in 2001 to a partner visa and had since been on resident return visas.

The NSW police commissioner, Mal Lanyon, said the two men had lived at another house in Bonnyrigg, in the city’s west, which was also raided on Sunday night after the attack. He said there was nothing “to indicate that either of the men involved in yesterday’s attack was planning the attack”, and confirmed the older man had held a gun licence for a decade.

Lanyon refused to react or comment on reports claiming a manifesto or black Islamic State flag were found in the car driven to the scene by the alleged attackers. Instead of reducing the discourse to jingoistic Islamophobia, the North South Wales (NSW premier), Chris Minns, said there would “almost certainly” be changes to gun laws, and police were investigating whether there had been a failure of their systems in relation to how licensed weapons could have been used in a terror attack.

Attacker, a hard worker who enjoyed boxing?

Media reports also stated that, until recently, Naveed Akram had been working as a bricklayer. His employer then stated that he had taken him as an apprentice six years ago, describing him as a hard worker who never had time off. However, a few of months ago, he said Naveed reported that he’d broken his wrist while boxing, and would not be able to work again until 2026.

“He asked for all his entitlements paid up, annual leave and everything, but a lot of guys do that at end of year anyway,” said the employer, who did not wish to be named. He commented, “Now you can’t help but think, him getting all his money out, what’s he going to spend it on.”

He did not know Naveed well, saying he had employed dozens of people at the same time, but he was considered a quiet person. “In bricklaying, you work closely as a team on site, but he didn’t associate with anyone else out of hours … he’d have lunch himself, not with anyone else,” he said.

He said he knew Naveed came “from a Muslim background”, but Naveed did not speak much about religion at work. He said some employees had told him that Naveed’s parents had separated and that he closer to his father. He also contested claims that Naveed had lost his job, saying that he had wanted him to return to work, despite his wrist injury.

“He had been doing some boxing outside of hours … he said the doctor told him have a couple of months off,” the employer said. “I asked if he could come back a bit sooner … being a good worker and everything, I thought, fuck, I don’t want to lose this guy. “As a bricklayer, [I] could not fault him; his work was good. He was a good employee, as far as that goes.” Another bricklayer described Naveed as a strange colleague but a hard worker who had an interest in hunting. “No one was close to him,” said the former colleague, who did not wish to be named.

Although authorities have not said the son was a licensed firearms holder, the colleague claimed he hunted regularly, and spoke about shooting rabbits and other game around Crookwell, in the state’s southern tablelands. They worked across Sydney, with the last job in which he saw Naveed on a site in Penrith.

There has also been unconfirmed claims that Naveed was a member of a hunting club, after images emerged of what appears to be a membership card said to have been found in his wallet. However, these reports are unconfirmed.

Shortly after the attack, an old photo of Naveed originally posted by Sheikh Adam Ismail, the head of Al-Murad Institute, went viral. Ismail distanced himself from the man, telling Guardian Australia he hadn’t seen him since 2022. “As I’ve done with 1,000s of students over the years, I’ve taught him Qur’an recitation and Arabic only for a combined period of one year,” he said. Ismail said he was deeply saddened by what had occurred, and gave his condolences to the victims and Jewish community.

“[The] Qur’an … clearly states that taking one innocent life is like killing all of humanity. This makes it clear that what unfolded yesterday at Bondi is completely forbidden in Islam.”

At Bonnyrigg, reporters and police were gathered outside the home that remained cordoned off with blue tape on Monday morning. Two police cars were parked out the front. At around noon, three people returned to the house, which is owned by Naveed’s mother. A young man, and two women, who held paper over their heads to shield themselves from being filmed, exited a car and walked into the home.

Last year, the country was rocked by anti-Semitic attacks in Sydney and Melbourne. Synagogues and cars were torched, businesses and homes sprayed with graffiti and Jews attacked in those cities, where 85% of the nation’s Jewish population lives.

Albanese in August blamed Iran for two of the attacks and cut diplomatic ties to Tehran.

Israel urged Australia’s government to address crimes targeting Jews. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he warned Australia’s leader’s months ago about the dangers of failing to take action against antisemitism. He claimed Australia’s decision — in line with scores of other countries — to recognize a Palestinian state “pours fuel on the anti-Semitic fire.”

“Your government did nothing to stop the spread of anti-Semitism in Australia … and the result is the horrific attacks on Jews we saw today,” Netanyahu said.

Police will investigate what happened

Authorities were not looking for anyone else in connection with the massacre, said Lanyon. Police pledged a “thorough” investigation, he added. Further inquiries are likely to be announced.

Two improvised explosive devices were found at the scene. Bomb disposal experts rendered them safe. Lanyon described them as “rudimentary” devices that would have been detonated by a wick rather than a phone or electronically.

Australia rarely has mass shooting deaths

Minns said there would “almost certainly” be gun law changes after the massacre. The 50-year-old gunman who was shot dead was found to have six firearms when law enforcement raided the property where he’d been staying, police said. Questions about how he was able to acquire them gathered pace on Monday, in part because mass shootings in Australia are extremely rare. A 1996 massacre in the Tasmanian town of Port Arthur, where a lone gunman killed 35 people, prompted the government to drastically tighten gun laws, making it much more difficult to acquire firearms.

Significant mass shootings this century included two murder-suicides with death tolls of five people in 2014 and seven in 2018, in which gunmen killed their own families and themselves. In 2022, six people were killed in a shootout between police and Christian extremists at a rural property in Queensland State. Reported AP News.

World leaders express shock and grief

After the massacre, messages flooded in from leaders around the world. King Charles III said he and Queen Camilla were “appalled and saddened by the most dreadful anti-Semitic terrorist attack.” United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said on X he was horrified, and his “heart is with the Jewish community worldwide.”

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a post on X: “The United States strongly condemns the terrorist attack in Australia targeting a Jewish celebration. Anti-Semitism has no place in this world.”

Who Is Ahmed Al Ahmed, The Heroic Bystander Who Disarmed Sydney Shooter?

Local outlet 7News identified the man as 43-year-old Ahmed al Ahmed, a fruit seller. The report said he suffered two gunshot wounds during the attack. Unitedly, Australians on Sunday praised a man described as a “hero” after his quick thinking during a mass shooting at Sydney’s Bondi Beach, the deadliest attack in the country in years. Footage shared widely on social media showed the unarmed man tackling one of the gunmen as shots were being fired at civilians, a move believed to have saved many lives. The 15-second video shows the man hiding behind parked cars before running towards the gunman from behind. He grabs him by the neck, pulls away his rifle and forces him to the ground, before pointing the weapon back at him.

The man was identified as 43-year-old Ahmed al Ahmed, a fruit seller. He reportedly suffered two gunshot wounds during the attack.

7News spoke to a man named Mustapha, who said he was Ahmed’s cousin. “He’s in hospital and we don’t know exactly what’s going on inside,” he said. “We do hope he will be fine. He’s a hero 100 per cent,” he added. Ahmed was due to undergo surgery later that night. He reportedly had no experience with guns and was simply walking past the area when he decided to step in.

Online, he was widely praised for his bravery and fast reaction. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese also described him as a “hero”.

The Week, India headlined their story thus, No, ‘Bondi Hero’ was not a Jew! Who is ‘brave Muslim’ Ahmed al Ahmed, the fruit seller who disarmed the shooter in Australia?

43-year-old Ahmed al Ahmed, a fruit seller by profession, was the brave soul who tackled one of the Bondi Beach gunmen from behind and took away the loaded gun, Australian authorities have confirmed. The video of a civilian risking his life to disarm one of the Bondi Beach shooters had taken the internet by storm. The man had become an instant internet sensation, winning hearts worldwide for his selfless act and unparalleled courage as he ambushed the gunman from behind and forcefully took the loaded gun from him.

The identity of the “Bondi Beach Hero” was debated for a while before he was officially identified by Australian authorities. Many on social media initially hailed him as a Jewish man who stepped up to protect his fellow citizens before Benjamin Netanyahu himself “saluted” the “brave Muslim man” who “stopped the terrorists from killing innocent” people.

Having lost one of his guns to Ahmed, the shooter was forced to join his companion on the bridge. As the attacker retreated, Ahmed wasted no time to place the gun against a tree and raise his hands to ensure the law enforcement didn’t mistake him for a villain, reports said.

He had no previous experience with firearms and was forced to intervene as his conscience didn’t let him walk away. Ahmed al Ahmed suffered bullet injuries in the incident and remains hospitalised, waiting for surgery. His kin reportedly told Australian press that they don’t know much about his condition apart from the fact that his surgery is scheduled for the night. Ahmed is native to Sydney’s Sutherland Shire.

Related:

Pahalgam Attack: Kashmir unites in heroic resilience amid terror attack, proving humanity’s strength against hate narrative

Muslims in Kashmir & across India strongly condemn Pahalgam terror attack

Hyderabad Muslims come together to form a human chain and condemn terror attacks in Sri Lanka

The post Australia, World express shock at Sydney’s Bondi Beach terror attack, toll rises to 16, Govt promises stricter gun laws appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Looking at her 18-month-old daughter, Ayesha said, “Nurul wanted a girl, and here she is, but he is not. We were both only children. We didn’t want our child to grow up alone, but now she will. When she was born, so much was happening. No help reached me, but rumours spread that I was living comfortably with money. My in-laws abandoned me. My parents were under strain too. Some even blamed me for Nurul’s death. Then, the worst happened—my milk dried up just a month after Ashnoor’s birth. Breastfeeding stopped completely. The child had already lost her father’s shadow, and now this.” Ashnoor babbled on, pointing at her milk bottle.

Samreen’s daughter, two years old and a few months older than Ashnoor, has seen her father, Aamir. She played with him, teased him, and tired him out. She knows his face well. But she also saw him hanging from a fan, overwhelmed by a strangers’ cruelty. She doesn’t understand what it means. She asks Samreen, “Abbu went to the village. When will he come back?” Samreen pulls her close and pats her. What else can she do? Her wound is still fresh, from May 2025. In Latur’s Maidan Chowk, Aamir was beaten, called a Pakistani. They grabbed his collar, his belt, humiliated him, and recorded it on their phones. The label “Pakistani” shattered him. The next night, after 8 p.m., he took his life. It was a Sunday. Samreen said, “Every night from 8 to 9, I feel restless. Sad. How can I sleep in that room after his death? I stayed with my in-laws for 40 days, never sleeping before 3 a.m. Now, sometimes, I feel nothing at all. No one is truly yours. You carry your pain alone. Sundays used to excite me; now they scare me. Sometimes I think it was all a bad dream, and maybe it’s better that it broke.” Her voice trembles slightly. Her eyes well up. She removes her glasses, wipes her eyes gently, and with a mix of anger and detachment, says, “No one who promised help actually helped. Not even the police. Now I think, will doing anything bring him back? No. So I’m just trying to hold myself together.” For a moment, she stares into space, as if wrestling with herself.

“The situation in Vishalgad and Gajapur has been tense for years,” said Shaheen Mujawar from Vishalgad, her voice tinged with fear. “It gets worse during festivals like Shiv Jayanti and Mahashivratri.” Aggressive sloganeering by some groups creates fear and unease. “Last year, on July 14, 2024, the violence during the so-called Vishalgad anti-encroachment campaign still haunts us. Some slogans were so offensive, it’s hard to repeat them publicly. After that, many children on the fort fell ill. Women went silent. For days, they didn’t know what was happening. Many couldn’t sleep at night. With no jobs now, even salt feels expensive, and the stress on women is immense. That day, just the news of the attack gave one of our relatives a heart attack, and he died on the spot. This year, on July 14, the same fear returned. Sixty percent of the people on the fort left voluntarily. No one wants to die bit by bit,” Shaheen said, her words vivid, as if reliving it all.

In India, a country rich with diversity, communal tensions between religious groups sometimes turn violent. In recent years, openly provocative speeches against Muslims have increased. Muslim men are targeted, attacked, and killed in the name of cow protection. Social media is used to stir public anger, and Muslim men’s lives are taken coldly. Taking a life has become as casual as throwing mud online. But the wounds from these mob attacks aren’t just physical. They deeply affect the families left behind, especially women. Ayesha and Samreen, both in their thirties, lost their husbands to hate-filled attacks. Women like Shaheen have faced the terror of violent mobs and death. These events leave lasting scars on women’s minds. Social stigma, institutional failures, and financial strain add to their burdens. These factors undoubtedly impact their mental state. This report tries to understand how.

Ayesha Shikalgar’s Story: The Pain That Can’t Be Explained

I never imagined that Hindu-Muslim hatred could reach a small village like Pusesavali. Nurul Hasan was the president of the village’s Ganpati committee. Most of his friends were Hindus. Sometimes, during my pregnancy, I’d crave something sweet at night. Nurul’s friend owned a shop, and he’d open it after hours just for me. That’s how close their friendship was. But the same people he celebrated Ganeshotsav with, the ones he called friends, are now his accused killers, Ayesha says, her voice trembling with anger. She asks some hard questions: “No matter what happened, what did anyone gain by taking an innocent life? These people who chant Shivaji Maharaj’s name—what will they tell him? They didn’t just take a life; they destroyed my entire family!” Her voice rises slightly. “Would Shivaji Maharaj approve of such killers? There’s no reason to oppose anyone’s faith, but shouldn’t devotion bring joy to others? Two minutes of rage changed my life’s struggles and sorrows. At 8 p.m., he was with me, our private life just beginning. By morning, my life, my world, became public—caught in the media’s hands. But there was no space left to express what was in my heart. I couldn’t even grieve Nurul’s death properly. The pain of losing a person, that agony, I can’t put into words. It’s a strain I still feel, and now, whenever I see a saffron flag, my heart skips a beat.” A faint tension lingers on her face, framed by her headscarf.

Nurul Hasan, 31, was one of the educated Muslim youths in Pusesavali. In a village of 1,300 families, less than 10% are Muslim. Most run small businesses—grocery stores, mobile shops, or auto parts stores. Nurul was a civil engineer, taking on construction contracts and renting out his JCB machine. He was the sole breadwinner for his parents, their only child. He and Ayesha were married in November 2022. On September 10, 2023, Hindu nationalist groups from Pusesavali and nearby villages started violence, claiming a Muslim youth’s social media post had hurt religious sentiments. They attacked Muslim homes, shops, and mosques. The youth who posted wasn’t even in the village that day. Police later found his phone was hacked, and no evidence was found against him. But by then, the mob’s attack had changed Ayesha’s life. She was five months pregnant at the time. Just the day before, they’d gone for her sonography. Nurul had wanted a girl and had chosen the name Ashnoor, blending their names together.

After her husband’s death, Ayesha faced what many Indian widows do. She was blamed for Nurul’s death. Her in-laws said she was responsible because Nurul was praying on time while living with her. They claimed his going for namaz led to his death. Their words were a huge blow to her. Ayesha, a lawyer by profession, says, “It wasn’t even four days after his death, and they started saying such things. It broke my heart. I started facing mental distress.” The government and some Muslim groups collected aid for her, but none reached her. “I was in iddat, the four-month seclusion Muslim widows observe. I heard people were helping, but nothing came to me. I thought maybe my in-laws got it. Then rumours spread that Nurul was in debt and the money went to clear it. I had to publicly clarify he had no debts. I didn’t want aid, but I wanted the rumours to stop. My in-laws even said I took the money. That led to family disputes. They turned away from me. When I gave birth, they didn’t even come to see their only granddaughter. When I went to their house, they’d left for my mother-in-law’s village for good. They cut me off completely, as if their son’s death made me a stranger. I was fighting society’s rumours the one hand and my own family on the other. It was so stressful.”

Around that time, the stress took a toll on her father. He had a heart attack, his diabetes worsened, and gangrene forced doctors to amputate part of his leg. “No one was there to help. Even my own family turned away. The women’s WhatsApp group in Pusesavali removed me. They mocked me as a ‘gold digger.’ We didn’t even have money for my father’s treatment. People thought we were rich. Some even said I was living lavishly off my husband’s death money,” Ayesha says with a bitter laugh. There’s no anger on her face, just disappointment. She continues calmly, “When I needed society’s support the most, they abandoned me. They excluded me from family functions. They attacked my character. That defamation broke me. My mental health deteriorated. I started getting dizzy. I lost track of what was happening around me. My daughter needed her mother’s milk, but the stress dried it up within a month. It was such an injustice to her. My weight shot past 100 kilos. I developed thyroid issues, diabetes, and high blood pressure. We didn’t even have money for food. My father has some farmland, but no other income. People kept saying I had so much money—well, I’m still waiting for it. Maybe someone’s words will come true,” she says, laughing at her situation. It’s clear Ayesha has found the strength to smile despite her circumstances.

Even two years later, in August 2025, when we met, the financial struggle persists. Her father was hospitalised again. To manage the back-and-forth between hospital and home, her family moved to her uncle’s place in Miraj. Her father’s sugar levels were high, and his mental health had deteriorated too. Ayesha is trying to cope. She wonders if Nurul were alive, would she have to live this nomadic life. She’s also frustrated that she hasn’t gotten enough information about her husband’s case. She had to use her contacts to even get the charge sheet.

As she tries to move forward, Ayesha faces more challenges. “If I’m happy, people say I’m enjoying life after my husband’s death because I got money. If I’m sad, they say it is only because I didn’t get my in-laws’ property. If I focus on my daughter, they say I’m not interested in my husband’s case. People talk from all sides, and I don’t have the strength to explain myself anymore. I feel so alone. I can’t even work right now. My daughter is 18 months old. She’d be alone too. I worry about her. I don’t want her to grow up hating Hindus. I don’t want her to waste her energy on hate. That’s why I’ve started preparing for the JMFC exam. The environment around Ayesha is always tense and negative. I tried to find a house in Karad or Sangli, leaving my village, Rajachi Kurle. But as soon as people hear I’m from Pusesavali or Nurul Hasan’s widow, they say no. Being Muslim and a single mother doesn’t help. I’ve been looking for a house for four months. How do I describe the pain of rejection? Some say no one rents to Muslims after the Pahalgam attack. But my husband was killed here—how dare anyone say that? These experiences have broken me. People often say if Nurul hadn’t gone to confront those people, he wouldn’t have died. So, the attackers, the violent ones, aren’t at fault, but he is to be blamed for taking to task his so-called friends? It’s such an easy blame game. Nurul was a great friend, a great partner. He helped with my work and took care of me. I lost such a person. That pain will always stay. But let me tell you…”

Ayesha takes a deep breath and says, “I’m tired of being seen as a victim or a gold digger. Pusesavali’s incident and the label of Nurul’s widow have stamped my life. I want to change that image. I may fail as a wife, but I won’t fail as a mother. People keep looking at me through that same lens. When I try to move forward, they tie that image to my feet like a burden. It causes me so much mental pain.”

Samreen Pathan: Holding on Through Loneliness

Samreen and Aamir had been married for three years. They have a two-year-old daughter. Samreen works as an assistant manager at a bank, while Aamir was a relationship officer at a telecom company. Both were from Latur, and both had jobs there. But eight or ten months ago, Samreen got a job at a different bank’s branch in Dharashiv. Aamir, not wanting her career to stall, didn’t care about his own job and moved to Dharashiv with her. Once Samreen settled into her routine there, he returned to Latur for work, taking their daughter along. Samreen wasn’t used to living alone, having grown up in a big family. So, she’d come to Latur every weekend, spend two days with them, and return to work. Samreen says, “I’d wake up early, go to the office, meet clients, and spend weekends together. That was our routine. For years, we heard about the growing Hindu-Muslim tension and hatred in society, but it never touched our lives. Aamir’s closest friends were Hindus. At my office, we all worked together harmoniously. No big fights, no complaints, nothing. Everything was peaceful, simple, friendly. But now, something feels different. This incident shocked us. We were happy in our own world. Why us?” she asks, her voice heavy with pain, before falling silent for a moment. Even meeting her in Dharashiv wasn’t easy—she wasn’t eager to talk. It’s understandable. Reliving those memories, retelling her story, is exhausting. The police’s mishandling of her complaint only adds to her distress. When we met at her bank’s premises, Samreen, barely looking thirty, wore simple clothes and glasses. She buries her grief in work, pulling herself forward for the next day.

Since Aamir’s suicide, sleep has been hard for Samreen. The incident left him deeply traumatized, and his suicide is clear proof of that. Samreen recalls, “That day, I was nearing Latur and called him to pick me up. The bus stops at Maidan Chowk, where I was getting off. He’d reached the chowk on his scooter, crossing the road. A local journalist was driving by. Aamir signalled to him, ‘Wait two minutes, let me cross.’ But that hurt the journalist’s ego.” Samreen starts recounting that day’s conversation. The shouting, the voices, still create a fearful tension in her mind. It was a regular Saturday, a routine return to her hometown to see her family and daughter, to recharge and go back to work. A predictable, peaceful routine. But that evening was different. Samreen continues, “The journalist got out of his car, parked it in the middle of the road, and started beating my husband. He asked, ‘What’s your name?’ Aamir said, ‘Aamir Pathan.’ The journalist sneered, ‘What, you think you’re some big Aamir? You’re a Pakistani, a Kashmiri, unfit to live in this country.’ Then he kept hitting him, yanked his pants, took photos, and recorded videos. ‘I’m a journalist,’ he said. ‘This will be in the papers.’ I was on the phone, hearing it all. I asked who he was talking to. I could hear Aamir’s voice, shouting, ‘What did I do wrong? Why are you hitting me?’” The incident happened on May 4, 2025 and was reported a few days later.

The incident left Aamir under immense stress. He was terrified the journalist would call him a terrorist or worse in the next day’s paper. He wanted to file a police complaint but lacked the courage. He called friends for help, telling them what happened. No one responded positively. They told him not to make a big deal, to let it go, or they’d see about it later. The beating had already scared him, but the fact that a stranger could threaten and humiliate him, and his close friends didn’t care, hurt him deeply. The journalist had yanked his pants so hard it caused physical discomfort. Aamir kept telling Samreen about it. She says, “Until 2 a.m., he was on his phone, searching for information about the journalist. At 6 a.m., he checked the papers, worried something was printed against him, calling him a Pakistani. He was so scared. The stress lasted till afternoon. His scooter was damaged, so he got it fixed. We were supposed to attend a reception that evening. He said, ‘Go ahead, I’ll rest and join you.’ When we got there, his phone wasn’t reachable. My mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and I returned home, only to find he’d taken his life.” Samreen, trying to stay strong, has tears in her eyes. She complains the police delayed action. The journalist was influential, connected to politicians, so they wouldn’t take her complaint. The next day, they went to the station at 9 a.m., but the police kept them waiting until 6 p.m., asking for CCTV footage and more. Samreen says, “The police said they’d register a suicide case but wouldn’t mention ‘Pakistani’ or ‘Kashmiri.’ We gave them the car’s number, but they refused to name the journalist in the complaint. We didn’t even know who he was at first. It feels like the police helped him escape by delaying. It affected me deeply. At first, it was unbearable. Now, I feel nothing. Everything’s numb. People come, ask questions, gather information, but no one truly helps. I have no expectations anymore, especially from the police. They suppressed everything. Some even accused us, saying we had political connections and were framing the journalist. The thief calling us liars! We lost our loved one, and we’re the ones filing a complaint?” Her anger peaks as she speaks, her frustration clear in every word. Recalling it chokes her up. She steadies herself and continues, “If I keep thinking about this, how willI run my home? I bury myself in work. Otherwise, I’d have collapsed completely. Evenings make me restless, especially between 8 and 9 p.m. Sundays feel unbearable now. I feel so alone. But I hold on for my daughter.”

Samreen now lives alone with her daughter in Dharashiv. Her mother helps care for the child, but Samreen expects nothing from anyone. “There’s no one to share your pain with. Sometimes, I wish it never happened, like waking from a bad dream to a normal day. Aamir was so good. He’d say, ‘Do what you want, I’m with you,’ and he proved it. Now, there’s only loneliness.”

Ayesha and Samreen, both in their thirties, were busy weaving dreams of family, children, a new life, and stability. They had little sense of the hatred and violence beyond their safe world. Even if such things existed, they felt far away. They lived in a space of harmony, believing no harm could touch them.

What to serve for dinner to men returning from work?

Vishalgad-Gajapur, in Kolhapur’s Shahuwadi taluka, is a cluster gram panchayat. It includes the fort’s village, Gajapur’s Muslimwadi, Vanipeth, Sainath Peth, Baudhwadi, Kembhurnewadi, Bhattali, and small hamlets stretching to Pavan Khindi. The road from Pandhrepani to Gajapur winds through dense forests, with the Kasari dam’s water on one side. The area is breezy year-round but remote, with poor phone connectivity. Naturally, job opportunities are scarce. The main sources of income are tourism and visitors to the local dargah. But violence causes more than just human loss—it devastates livelihoods. The tourism that sustained these remote hamlets has collapsed, and rumours about safety have spread. When the economic balance crumbles, the burden falls on women. Whether a man earns enough or not, feeding the family is a woman’s responsibility, and the stress of figuring out what to cook weighs heavily on them. Shaheen Mujawar explains, “There’s never been tension among locals in Vishalgad’s villages. Even now, communities support each other. But for the last two or three years, the atmosphere has been deliberately poisoned. There’s a court case about encroachments on Vishalgad, yet mobs from outside came and disrupted everything. Worst of all, jobs have vanished. Families have left these hamlets for work elsewhere, facing burdens from rent to household expenses. Children’s schools have been disrupted or changed. Income and expenses don’t align, making it hard for women to run households. People literally don’t have money for salt. If the gas runs out, they wonder who to turn to. Men face work stress, so women can’t tell them about grocery shortages. Every day, they wake up wondering what to cook. By evening, they hope their man comes home, but they dread him asking for food because they don’t know what to offer. Many of us aren’t used to working outside, and some families don’t allow it. If we’re not safe at home, how can we face harassment outside as Muslims?”

A fact-finding report by Salokha Sampark Gat, the Centre for Study of Society and Secularism, and Women’s Struggle for Peace details the violence in Vishalgad and Gajapur on July 14, 2024. It describes the physical, mental, and economic toll, with chilling accounts from Muslimwadi’s women. That day, most men were away for work, leaving elderly people, women, and children behind. The report notes: “Women in Muslimwadi faced terror all day. A mob armed with knives and hammers stormed in. As they pounded on doors, women barricaded them with sofas, chairs, and beds to keep them out. To stop children from crying, women stuffed cloth in their mouths to keep them quiet. Attackers broke doors, entered homes, and smashed everything—TVs, fridges, mixers, beds, chairs, mattresses. They left nothing intact. Scooters and vehicles were smashed with stones and hammers. Six scooters outside one house were piled up and burned. Fifteen to twenty men invaded each home, breaking windows, tearing roofs, burning clothes. Kitchen supplies—grain, flour, food—were thrown out. The entire settlement was destroyed. Women watched their life’s work turn to dust in moments. Attackers asked women their names, insulting those with Muslim names. One woman gave a Hindu name, but when they demanded her Aadhaar card and she didn’t have it, she locked herself inside. They broke the door, entered, and beat her. Reshma Prabhulkar, who runs a small bangle and clothing shop next to her house, didn’t open her door. The mob broke into her shop, detonated her cooking gas cylinder, and set her home’s contents ablaze.” Even without deaths, such incidents push women into a shell, layering pressure on them—worrying about their men’s safety, then their own. Women who’ve fought for freedom retreat, prioritizing others over themselves. This can lead to clinging to religious norms or societal pressures, starting a cycle of isolation, suppression, and disconnection from society, harming their mental health.

Rehana Mursal from Shantisathi Mahila Sangharsh Manch (Women’s Struggle for Peace) shared a haunting observation: “Visiting homes in Gajapur and Vishalgad, I saw children clutching their mothers’ saree ends and stuffing them in their mouths. When I asked why, the women said that during the attack, as men were beaten outside, children hiding with their mothers understood what was happening. Terrified and trembling, they wanted to scream. To keep their hiding spots secret, mothers stuffed saree or scarf ends in their children’s mouths to silence them. The kids struggled to breathe, but the cloth stayed until the chaos subsided. Now, scared children do this themselves when strangers come, stuffing their mothers’ sarees in their mouths. What kind of present and future are we giving these kids? How do we erase this trauma?”

Talking to Ayesha, Samreen, and the women of Vishalgad-Gajapur, one thing stood out: Islamophobia and patriarchy leave Muslim women isolated. Ayesha and Samreen both lost their in-laws’ support—treated as irrelevant once their husbands died. Their Muslim identity made filing complaints difficult, and they were kept away from their cases. They’ve had to take on family responsibilities, including jobs, while raising children alone. Financial strain suffocates them. Women wearing hijabs or burqas face barriers in education and jobs. Such incidents create fear, stopping bold girls from stepping out. Muslim vendors face boycotts, crippling their businesses. Finding homes is tough, with Muslims facing discrimination. Workers endure unequal treatment. Amid these social injustices, mental health is side-lined. The fear, loneliness, and constant vigilance Muslim women face are deep scars of communalism, yet these emotional wounds are rarely discussed.

From Social Othering to Social Suffering

These incidents may seem rare, sparking debates about why discuss them. But in recent years, Muslims, especially men, have been systematically targeted. Hate speeches, calls to displace Muslims, cow vigilantism, and mob killings are rising, as shown in the 2024 India Hate Lab and Hate Crime Report: Mapping First Year of Modi’s Third Government. These reports highlight how anti-Muslim hatred is growing organised, political, and normalised. India Hate Lab recorded 1,165 hate speech incidents in 2024, with 1,050 targeting Muslims, occurring in political rallies, religious processions, and election campaigns. Of these, 266 involved BJP leaders. Terms like “love jihad,” “land jihad,” and “vote jihad” were joined by new ones like “mazar jihad,” “UPSC jihad,” “fertilizer jihad,” and “rail jihad,” spreading false narratives to fuel hatred. Uttar Pradesh saw the most incidents (242, up 132% from last year), followed by Maharashtra with 210 hate speech cases, a 78% rise from 118 in 2023. Of Maharashtra’s cases, 195 targeted Muslims, 14 targeted both Muslims and Christians, and one was anti-Christian. May’s Lok Sabha elections and November’s assembly elections saw peaks, with 32 incidents in May alone. Political leaders and Hindu nationalist groups used these periods to inflame religious sentiments. From August to November, 90 incidents were recorded.

The Hate Crime Report notes 947 hate crimes from June 2024 to June 2025, including 602 violent incidents. In 173 mob attacks, 25 Muslim men died. Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, and Maharashtra were particularly sensitive. Maharashtra saw 101 hate speeches, with 178 by BJP-linked leaders, including the Prime Minister, Chief Ministers, MPs, and others. Of 947 hate crimes, only 81 (13%) led to FIRs, and no political leaders faced action. These are just recorded cases—unreported ones are unknown. The data shows hate is being normalized, a worrying trend.

Mental health discussions for families affected by riots, violence, and hate speech often focus on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), noting symptoms like depression, insomnia, or lack of focus. But the broader societal impact is ignored. The “social othering” from religious divides and its mental toll are overlooked. Mental health can’t be separated from daily life’s small and big struggles. Bebaak Collective’s report, Social Suffering in a World without Support: Report on Mental Health of Indian Muslims, highlights this. Researcher and founder Hasina Khan says, “Studying religious and social hatred, we realized Indian Muslims’ mental health reflects political oppression and societal hate. Talking to victims of hate crimes and riots, we saw that discussing emotions, habits, and relationships reveals how communalism changes Muslim lives. Mental health studies can’t stop at PTSD or depression. Violence affects daily life, so we must understand its impact on future aspirations, financial security, and health. Muslim mental health isn’t just about communalism—it underscores everyday exclusion. Some faced physical effects: one family member had a heart attack, another victim’s mother lost her sanity. Women’s mobility is restricted, they grow isolated, neighbors drift away, friends from their own and other communities shrink back. Youth face future anxiety, leading to depression. Activists feel fear and despair, grappling with helplessness and stress. Constant vigilance in public spaces harms mental health, yet it’s rarely discussed.” Mental health expert Shamima Asgar adds, “Clinical mental health approaches are individual-focused, addressing personal pain and trauma but not the root causes of violence. Instead, the focus is on coping with its effects, implying the violence will persist, and you must adapt.” In short, addressing the problem requires tackling its roots, viewing Muslim mental health as social suffering.

Hasina’s point is key: religiously motivated violence and inflammatory speeches are politically driven, a tool of oppression. When such attacks come from institutions, who takes responsibility? The institutions themselves should, as Muslims are citizens under their care. Preventing injustices, mob deaths, and attacks is their duty, as is supporting victims afterward. Otherwise, how will affected families and women stand again? Trauma needs support. Women whose lives are upended by religious hatred need space to express their pain freely and a chance to move forward. Samreen sees her busy life as healing. Mental health taboos often stop women from seeking counselling or therapy, so it should be offered at a government level. Ayesha was encouraged by Satara’s rural police superintendent to try therapy. She says, “I had no idea about counselling or therapy. I thought I was strong. The way I handled things, spoke, and acted made me think I was fine. But therapy showed me I was bottling up my pain. I didn’t even know how much I’d suppressed. I had headaches, irritability, and despair. Sometimes, I felt nothing, like I was numb. The world talked about my tragedy, but I seemed strong on the outside. Therapy taught me I hadn’t moved past the shock. It helped me accept it slowly. Five or six months later, I cried openly for the first time. My heart felt lighter. I realized I needed to think about what’s next, how to live. The stress is temporary. What’s permanent? My daughter. She’s, my anchor.” Ayesha got help, but not from the government.

Improving mental health requires concrete steps at social, political, and legal levels. Rehana Mursal and Hasina Khan suggest permanent peace committees and administrative systems in every district to prevent violence and promote unity. Civil groups should monitor justice systems, support victims, and pressure authorities to act against perpetrators. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) and Minority Commission (NCM) should investigate alongside police to ensure justice. State governments should compensate victims of hate crimes. Local groups, women’s collectives, and organizations should offer emotional support and safe spaces. Counselling and trauma care should be available in Muslim-majority areas. Health workers need training to handle hate crime victims sensitively. Mental health experts should study the impact of class, caste, and religion on health, and mental health laws must be actively enforced.

Reflecting on Hasina’s words, we can’t ignore changes in emotions, behaviour, and relationships. How do we fix or undo them? When Samreen’s daughter asks when her father will return, what can she say? “We had our routine,” she said, hinting at the joy it brought. Yet, when she called her mother-in-law to stay with her, their avoidance hurt her. How do you compensate for the time needed to process this? Still, Samreen says, “I’ve accepted he’s not coming back. I live for my daughter.” Ayesha echoed this: “Even after marriage, I wasn’t very mature. I was a silly, carefree girl, always laughing, lost in dreams. Nurul let me be that way. Then this mountain of tragedy hit. It made me serious, wiped out my carefree nature. I struggled to accept that change, but now I have. My daughter matters most.” Should we call it good or bad that the daughters these mothers strive for are shielded from reality? Just then, Ashnoor grabbed Ayesha’s phone, pointing at her father’s photo, calling him “Abbu.” She recognizes him, but what will she think when she learns why he’s gone? Unknowingly, the system has made her part of this social suffering. What should she and other children like her do with this pain? In a society where religion overshadows humanity, it feels like we’re all casting shadows of hate. If we can, let’s pull our hands back.

Related:

CJP complains to Maharashtra DGP, Jalgaon SP over police role in Shiv Pratisthan rally amid Suleman Pathan lynching probe

Muslims, victims of targeted violence in Pusesavali, Satara: Fact-finding report

Pay compensation to Nurul Hasan Shikalgar’s family, order independent judicial inquiry: Satara Citizens to Maharashtra Govt

Why no action against hate monger, BJP leader, Vikram Pawaskar asks Bombay HC

Activists highlight decimated situation of Muslim houses, shops in Gajapur, Kolhapur post violence, deem authorities to be guilty of negligence

Violence, vandalism and arson in Kolhapur, Muslim houses and mosque targeted by mob that had gathered on the call of former RS MP Sambhaji Raje Chhatrapati

CJP flags 8 incidents of hate crime including lynchings to National Commission for Minorities

The post Silent Scars: How Muslim widows of hate crimes endure layered, unseen oppression appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The video—which has been widely circulated on social media and reported by The Wire—shows Tasing telling voters unequivocally:

“Government schemes will not go to those panchayat segments where the BJP is defeated… I do what I say.”

He reiterates the same statement moments later: “The panchayat segments where the BJP candidates lose will not get any scheme. As the panchayati raj minister, I mean what I say.”

The complaint argues that this constitutes a direct threat of withdrawal of welfare benefits, amounting to undue influence, coercion, and misuse of official position under the Representation of the People Act, 1951 (Sections 123(2) and 123(8)), as well as a serious breach of the Model Code of Conduct (MCC), which prohibits ministers from using their office to influence electors or making promises or threats linked to government schemes.

CJP, through its complaint, stresses that Tasing’s statement is not merely a political appeal, but an assertion made in his capacity as a sitting minister, explicitly invoking ministerial authority to condition access to State welfare on political loyalty. According to the complaint, this “strikes at the core of the principle of free electoral choice” and undermines the constitutional guarantee that public welfare funds belong to citizens, not to political parties or individual ministers.

It has also been noted that the Congress party in Arunachal Pradesh has already filed a separate petition with the State Election Commission, calling the remark “unlawful” and demanding Tasing’s resignation. The SEC has reportedly sought a factual report from the district administration.

CJP contextualises the issue within broader constitutional norms, stating that the Supreme Court has repeatedly emphasised that elections must be insulated from state-backed inducement or intimidation, and that public schemes cannot be used as instruments for conditioning votes. It references the MCC guidelines for ministers as well as the RPA’s prohibition on “threats of injury” to voters.

The complaint seeks:

• Immediate cognisance by the ECI;
• Proceedings under Sections 123(2), 123(8), and 171C IPC/Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita equivalents;
• A direction to the State Election Commission to file an FIR;
• Public censure of the minister;
• And consideration of his temporary removal from campaign responsibilities until the inquiry is completed.

It further argues that allowing such statements to go unaddressed risks setting a precedent where ministers feel free to link welfare access to political compliance, weakening public trust in the neutrality of governance.

While BJP state leaders have distanced themselves from the remark—calling it Tasing’s “personal opinion”—the complaint states that the issue is not personal expression, but the misuse of ministerial authority during an active election period, a matter squarely within the jurisdiction of the Election Commission.

The complaint may be read here.

Image Courtesy: nenow.in

Related:

CJP moves NCM against surge in Hate Speech at Hindu Sanatan Ekta Padyatra

“All I Wanted Was Peace”: How 55-year-old widow Aklima Sarkar won back her citizenship

CJP files complaint over Malabar Hill incident involving Aadhaar checks and targeting of Muslim vendors

The Architecture of Polarisation: A structural analysis of communal hate speech as a core electoral strategy in India (2024–2025)

The post Complaint filed by CJP against Arunachal Minister Ojing Tasing for threatening denial of welfare schemes appeared first on SabrangIndia.

NBDSA’s review of the broadcast revealed that the anchor relied on stereotypes about Bengali-speaking Muslims—particularly the Miya community—misrepresented demographic and political data, and even connected the protest song to an entirely unrelated rape case with no causal link. The Authority noted that this narrative expansion could not be justified as news reporting; rather, it demonstrated that the anchor “had a particular agenda in mind.” By weaving isolated incidents into a communal narrative and introducing ideas like a “Jihadi syndicate” or a conspiracy to undermine Hindu traditions, the programme violated the NBDSA’s Code of Ethics and Specific Guidelines for Anchors, which bar generalisation, sensationalism, and the vilification of any community.

In its direction, the Authority has ordered Times Now Navbharat to remove all “offending portions” from the programme and submit a modified version within seven days. It also instructed that the order be circulated to all member broadcasters and uploaded on the NBDA website and in the next Annual Report. For CJP, the decision marks a significant regulatory affirmation of its consistent efforts to challenge communalised media narratives. For the wider media landscape, the order serves as a critical reminder that the authority to question and critique cannot be exercised through distortion, stereotype, or the manufacturing of communal fear.

The Complaint: CJP flags communal narrative, distortion, and fear-mongering

CJP’s complaint dated September 9, 2024 focused on a Times Now Navbharat programme titled: “Desh Ka Mood Meter: सनातन संस्कृति…कट्टरपंथियों के लिए सॉफ्ट टारगेट? | CM Himanta Biswa Sarma News” that aired on 2 September 2024. The show revolved around the arrest of Altaf Hussain, a Bengali-speaking Muslim singer from Assam, who had released a protest song highlighting discrimination against the Miya community. Following his arrest, the Chief Minister og Assam made a Facebook Live appearance calling the song “an attack” and alleging an attempt to “change Bihu into Miya Bihu”.

The Times Now Navbharat broadcast then used these remarks to spin a sweeping communal narrative.

CJP pointed out that the anchor:

• Presented the incident as part of a nationwide conspiracy against Hindu culture—linking Assam, Kerala, and Kashmir in a manufactured war-like narrative.
• Used dangerous phrases such as “Jihadi syndicate”, communal conspiracy, and “invasion”.
• Equated the term ‘Miya’ with illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, misrepresenting an entire community.
• Suggested that Muslims controlled 30 Vidhan Sabha seats and posed a demographic threat.
• Linked an isolated rape case to an entire community to insinuate collective criminality.
• Wove these disparate incidents into an overarching narrative that Hindus were under “attack”.

CJP also highlighted how the broadcast manipulated imagery, language, and tone to sharply polarise viewers and turn a cultural controversy into a nationwide Hindu-Muslim conflict.

The complete report may be read here.

Broadcaster’s Defence: ‘We only reported facts’

Times Now Navbharat denied all allegations:

• It claimed the show was only reporting the arrest and the Chief Minister’s views.
• It argued that it had differentiated between “Miya” Muslims and indigenous Assamese Muslims.
• It insisted that the depiction of demographics and electoral influence was factual.
• It refuted claims of fear-mongering, stating that the anchor was merely posing uncomfortable questions in the national interest.
• It accused the complainant of “selectively quoting snippets”.

Hearing Before NBDSA: CJP demonstrates how the anchor crafted a false national conspiracy

At the hearing held on February 22, 2025, CJP meticulously demonstrated that:

• The anchor’s opening monologue itself framed the entire show as an attack on Hindu festivals “from Assam to Kerala”.
• This was not reportage but a deliberate, pre-set narrative.
• The anchor bundled unrelated issues—the singer’s arrest, a rape case, Onam interpretations, and alleged temple name changes—to craft a false story of Hindus under siege.
• The rhetoric used was not factual journalism but fear-inducing, divisive, and ethically unsound.

NBDSA’s Findings: “Anchor had an agenda in mind”

• Reporting the arrest itself was legitimate—but the anchor went far beyond facts

The Authority noted that reporting the arrest and discussing the Chief Minister’s criticism of the song was well within the channel’s rights. But the problem was everything that followed.

• “The narrative built by the anchor went much beyond that”

NBDSA found that:

• The anchor introduced communal stereotypes, generalisations, and insinuations against a specific community.
• He linked the singer’s song to an unrelated rape case, despite “no causal connection”.
• He used the incident as an opportunity to push an agenda-driven narrative.

• “The anchor had a particular agenda in mind”

This is one of the strongest observations NBDSA has made in recent orders. The Authority stated that the anchor appeared to seize the incident as a chance to craft a pre-decided, communal storyline.

“In the process, the anchor brings a stereotype in respect of a particular community which could clearly have been avoided. The anchor also connects the song with an incident of rape, though there was no causal connection and the two things arc altogether separate and distinct. It seems the anchor had a particular agenda in mind and got this opportunity to build his narrative, bearing in mind the said agenda. It is this generalisation which falls foul of the BDSA’s Code of Ethics and Broadcasting Standards as well as the Specific Guidelines for Anchors conducting Programmes including Debates.”

• This violates the Code of Ethics and the Specific Guidelines for Anchors

NBDSA held that the broadcast breached:

• requirements of impartiality,
• fairness,
• neutrality,
• and the mandates for non-sensational, non-communal reporting.

The Direction: Remove offending content, re-publish edited version

NBDSA issued a clear directive:

• Times Now Navbharat must modulate the programme by removing all offending portions.
• The broadcaster must submit the edited link to NBDSA within 7 days.
• The order will be circulated internally to all NBDA member channels, editors, and legal heads.
• It will be hosted publicly on NBDA’s website and included in the Authority’s Annual Report.

Why this order matters

For CJP: It validates months of rigorous, evidence-driven media accountability work and strengthens future interventions against hate speech and communal propaganda.

For media regulation: The order sets a clear precedent that anchors cannot camouflage communal narratives under the guise of “uncomfortable questions”.

For newsroom ethics: The order draws a sharp line between reporting and communal agenda-setting, holding anchors accountable—not just for factual accuracy but for narrative construction.

For public discourse: It recognises how dangerous and corrosive it is when mainstream news links isolated crimes to entire communities or constructs conspiracies around minorities.

The complete order may be read here.

Image Courtesy: Youtube.com

Related:

When Erosion Stole Her Home, a Foreigners’ Notice Tried to Steal Her Citizenship: Hamela Khatun triumphs over foreigner tag

CJP files complaint over Malabar Hill incident involving Aadhaar checks and targeting of Muslim vendors

Two Hate-Filled Speeches, One Election: CJP complaints against Himanta Biswa Sarma and Tausif Alam for spreading hate and fear in Bihar elections

The post NBDSA Raps Times Now Navbharat for communal, agenda-driven broadcast; orders removal of inflammatory segments appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The Court’s perspective on this issue brings to bear a number of important constitutional issues that need to be addressed immediately. Firstly, having access to content related to “obscenity” linked to the Aadhaar number will also mean that all online anonymity will cease to be protected and, in effect, this will increase the amount of control given to the government regarding what individuals are allowed to view and/or post online. Secondly, since the meaning of “obscenity” has always been subject to personal opinion and moral bias, if the Court continues to follow a technological enforcement of this concept, it will result in an enormous increase in the amount of government control over online spaces such as YouTube and other OTT platforms and, ultimately, over independent creators.

From the Ranveer Allahabadia Matter to Systemic Control

The Court’s changing view can be traced back to a case involving Ranveer Allahabadia, a YouTuber accused of producing “obscene” and “immoral” video content. This case raised the question of whether the legal rules and regulations currently in effect were sufficient to govern such content. As stated in the Supreme Court Observer respectfully, it appeared as though the Court was more concerned with the potential risks posed by unregulated digital content than with determining whether the petitioner was harmed by the defendant’s content. A similar finding was reported in the Global Freedom of Expression case report from Columbia University, which stated that the petitioner did not present evidence of legal harm, but instead framed the issues through the lens of moral panic.

Following this, the positions taken by the Supreme Court became increasingly broad, culminating in a March 2025 request by the Court to the Union government to think about enacting a law creating a national standard for “online obscenity”. In doing so, the Court transitioned from addressing the content grievance in a singular context to calling for a systematic legislative approach to achieve the same. The Court stated that India lacked a neutral, independent regulatory authority to oversee online content.

In late 2025, the ongoing confusion within the legal framework surrounding Aadhaar culminated in the formulation of a very specific concept regarding how Aadhaar should be used as the basis for age verification for the purposes of preventing minors from accessing pornographic materials. This was not simply a passing comment or procedural matter but was rather a comprehensive strategy of linking an individual’s access to online material directly to an individual’s biometric identity through Aadhaar’s use as an age verification mechanism.

The March 2025 Direction and the Government’s Parallel Initiatives

The Supreme Court’s March 2025 directive to the Executive branch of the Union Government came at a time when the Executive branch had been assessing the types of control that it might use to regulate digital content. Witnesses described that the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting was looking into creating regulations that would provide new rules for the regulation of “perverse user-generated content,” which was echoed by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who had testified to the Supreme Court.

At the same time, there was an effort on behalf of the Central Government to push out an Influencer Code, resulting in concern over the lack of public consultation. The Internet Freedom Foundation recorded those concerns in its report and called for a consultation on the matter. The report can be read here.

Many parties were warning that the Supreme Court’s strong push for new legislative enactments could have a chilling effect on legitimate online speech, with reports in The Hindu explaining this matter and how it combined with the earlier actions by the Executive branch indicating an increasing amount of judicial interest in the regulation of social media, and the ability of the Supreme Court to regulate online speech.

Therefore, what once appeared to be one case of litigation has been seen to be braided into a more significant regulatory push. The Supreme Court and the Executive branch are seen to mutually reinforce each other’s concerns regarding digital content.

Obscenity as a Legal Category: Colonial Morality in Digital Form

India’s obscenity doctrine has its origins in the pre-constitutional era. The Interpretation of Section 292 in the IPC has been based on the moral standards of Victorian England, in how sexual expression was viewed as corruptive. Although the Supreme Court has attempted to modernize the definition of “obscene” in Aveek Sarkar v. State of West Bengal by moving from the Hicklin test to current community standards, the concept of obscenity remains the most unclear and controversial definition in Indian Law.

Traditionally, the word “obscene” has been a means to censor the expression of LGBTQ+ individuals, feminists, those providing information about reproductive health, those who produce artistic works and literature, and people who provide sex education. By using the same definition of obscenity to create and regulate content within the digital space, these definitions will encompass many types of legitimate speech, i.e., queer content, experimental art, sex education content being made on YouTube, and narratives of survivors.

Because spaces for digital creators, i.e., YouTube and OTT platforms, are some of the only ways that individuals can currently communicate with large audiences that are not already censored within the media through either governmental control or the NBDSA, independent creators possess the unique ability to produce their content on these platforms without any type of government interference. By establishing obscenity regulations, the autonomy that independent creators currently possess would be lessened, allowing the government to indirectly suppress dissent, satire, and criticisms of the established cultural/ethical norms of society, under the guise of “protecting” minors.

Aadhaar-Based Age Verification: The Constitutional Faultlines

The Court’s finding that the Aadhaar system could be used as an age gate for virtual media raises significant constitutional issues.

Article 19 (1) (a) grants individuals a right to receive information as well as to express themselves. Using Aadhaar to authenticate access to digital content destroys the ability to remain anonymous and connects people’s viewing patterns with their biometric identity. Because of this linkage, individuals may feel deterred from viewing and/or interacting with material that is sensitive in nature, including material related to political criticism, mental health, LGBTQ resource issues, and sexual education.

Article 21 requires that any encroachment upon an individual’s right to privacy must meet the proportionality tests outlined in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India. Aadhaar-based verification of an individual’s age does not meet these criteria as it is neither required nor proportionate. Alternative methods of age verification that do not require individuals to disclose their identities, such as anti-fraud age verification or token-based confirmation of age, may serve as less invasive methods.

Article 14 addresses the issue of classification. Because obscenity is a subjective classification and is inconsistently applied across jurisdictions, an identity-linked filtering system allows arbitrary and disparate restriction of content. Thus, material labelled as “immoral” or “perverse” can disproportionately affect marginalized producers of content, as well as LGBTQ related materials, political satire, or criticisms of majority morality.

Globally, similar types of legislation have been challenged and have been ruled unconstitutional in court. In the U.S., age-verification laws in Utah, Arkansas, and Texas were found to violate an individual’s right to privacy by imposing a chill on lawful speech. Additionally, the Digital Economy Act in the U.K. abandoned the use of age verification due to privacy concerns and the difficulty of implementing that scheme. The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) of the EU presumes large-scale identity verification in order to access content as a violation of existing privacy law. Finally, Aadhaar-based filtering is significantly more intrusive than any other methodology described above and places India outside the realm of established international norms based on rights.

Who Classifies Obscenity?

In what is likely the most important question raised by the Court’s recent remarks, the issue of determining what constitutes obscenity remains unresolved. While the Court has suggested that a neutral and independent body should make this determination, the historical patterns of regulatory bodies in India indicate that there will be an ongoing struggle for executive supremacy over regulatory bodies. Even self-regulatory agencies are often placed under significant amounts of state pressure, as evidenced by SCObserver’s analysis of takedown jurisprudence found in Wikimedia Foundation v. ANI and pointing to the inherent risk that any regime to classify material as obscene will be manipulated by the political elite in a country where the lines between nationalism and morality have become increasingly unclear. Therefore, it is highly probable that any form of content that has been deemed ‘anti-national’, ‘anti-authority’, or ‘anti-Indian’ will likely be categorized with what is generally regarded as immoral.

The Political and Practical Risks: Can Balance Exist?

Although it is almost impossible to find a balanced approach to controlling minors from unlawful exposure to cyberspace content while at the same time protecting individuals’ right to free speech, the current regulatory developments within India indicate that finding a true balance is aspirational at best. Increasing pressure from the governing body and the continual expansion of the IT Rules, as well as significant interest in ensuring traceability of cyber content, lack of information regarding reasons for user information withdrawal, and draft regulations for influencer(s) will only serve to establish an overwhelming level of executive control over the speech and behaviour of individuals within cyberspace.

In this context, obscene content provides an excellent opportunity for state intervention by way of protecting children but ultimately provides an opening for vague state regulation of all forms of expression. Such an increase in state authority will rarely decrease, as has been pointed out by many authorities in constitutional law who cautioned against the expansion of state power.

Safeguards against a Moral-Political Regime

The Supreme Court’s development of a new anti-obscenity regime should include critical safeguards, including:

1. a transition from ‘moral’ definitions to ‘harm’ based definitions;
2. an independent and accountable regulatory authority not influenced or dominated by the Executive;
3. a requirement for all regulations to be developed with transparency and public consultations;
4. a strong commitment to continuing judicial review over takedown requests; and
5. a prohibition on access to content via Aadhar-based identity links.

If these safeguards are not implemented, India risks creating a system where the use of morality as a justification for censorship, identity as a currency for realizing one’s right to access information, and a re-definition of digital public spaces under the control of State powers occur.

The judgment in Aveek Sarkar v. State of West Bengal can be read here:

The judgment in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India can be read here:

The judgment in Wikimedia Foundation v. ANI can be read here:

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

Related

The Sentinel and the Shift: Free speech in the Supreme Court

Free Speech in the Digital Age: A doctrinal analysis of four recent Supreme Court cases on Article 19(1)(a)

Ranveer Allahbadia: A “victim” of selective outrage?

Don’t cross the line: Courts on media trials and erring conduct of anchors

Free Speech Upheld: Bombay HC strikes down IT (Amendment) Rules, 2023 as unconstitutional

The post When Morality Meets Surveillance: The court’s push toward state-regulated digital content appeared first on SabrangIndia.