Religious bigots and vigilantes went into an overdrive in Karnataka last year with at least 60 recorded incidents of oppression and violence driven by communal motivations. These include incidents of moral policing, alleged religious conversion, hate speech, cattle related vigilantism and desecration of places of worship.
Out of a total of 60 recorded incidents, 9 are about moral policing, mostly involving relationships across the religious divide. There were three allegations of religious conversion, 11 instances of violence in the name of cattle protection by individuals and members of cow protection groups and 12 instances of hate speech. There were also eight cases of attacks on places of worship. Additionally, there were 17 other communally charged incidents.
These have all been compiled by Suresh Bhat B., member, Karnataka Communal Harmony Forum and PUCL Mangaluru, in a report titled Engineering Communal Polarisation. Some of the incidents recorded include the performance of a tableau where school children re-enacted the demolition of the Babri Mosque. The incident took place on December 15 at Sri Rama School in Kalladka town of Dakshin Kannada district.
Another incident that took place on January 14 in Baindur is recorded as follows, “Miscreants threw pieces of a pig’s leg and ear inside the compound of the Noor Jamia Juma Mosque at Nagur near Kirimanjeshwar here at night. The mischief came to light early next morning when the muezzin discovered the pork pieces. The CCTV footage shows two men arriving on a motorcycle, throwing the pork pieces and going away at 10:55 in the night. Upon a complaint by the administrative committee of the mosque, Baindur police came to the spot and made inquiries and collected the CCTV footage.” It added, “The police have arrested five persons in this connection. They are Navin Kharvi, Sridhar Kharvi, Raghavendra Kharvi Tarapati, Ravi Chandra and Nagraj.”
Mosques were once again targeted in Puttur on May 10. The report says, “It has been reported that miscreants threw bottles at three mosques in the early hours today. The mosques targeted are Majidul Bari Juma Masjid at Thingalady in Kedambady village, Baithul Rahman Juma Masjid at Darbe in Sarve village and Rifayiya Masjid at Sarve junction. It is suspected that the same gang committed the crime in all the three places.”
The report may be viewed here.
It is noteworthy that 228 such incidents were recorded in 2015 alone. Another 173 were recorded in 2014, and 125 in 2017. But, the report itself states, “All data are based on available local media reports. It is likely that there could be quite a number of unreported cases too.”