The book which has been widely reviewed including by the New York Times, Publisher’s Weekly, Kirkus and Tribune India was also a 2025 Pulitzer Prize Finalist for General Nonfiction. The Pulitzer Board called it “a captivating account of a crusading South Indian’s murder, a mystery rich in local culture and politics that also connects to such global themes as authoritarianism, fundamentalism and other threats to free expression.” Sabrangindia is grateful for permission from the authors and publishers to publish four excerpts, at intervals of the book.

The characteristic spunk that epitomized Gauri Lankesh, was evident in the courageous move she made for English to Kannada writing, taking over the mantle of Editor of the iconic Lankesh Patrike, on her father, Parvathi Lankesh’s demise. Her spoken and written Kannada at the time was sketchy and defying the rather patronizing advice of her then colleagues in the weekly, she jumped right in, penning editorials at the start in what the author describes as “clunky Kannada.” It was her editorship of this weekly that later morphed into Gauri Lankesh Patrike that radicalized her, and transformed her into an activist journalist. This chapter from the book also deals with her close involvement with the syncretic Baba Budangiri (Boudhangiri) movement in the early 2000s that preceded the Gujarat pogrom of 2002.

CHAPTER 11

The Ayodhya of the South

It was not long after Sreedhar launched Agni that Lankesh died and Gauri became editor of his paper. Lankesh Patrike didn’t miss a week. Its first issue under Gauri was a tribute to her father. And then the exodus began. Many of the paper’s staffers and writers were there solely for Lankesh, and with Lankesh gone, they quickly left, too. Yet she took the helm of the paper with surprising confidence. Early on she placed a phone call to Chandre Gowda, who wrote a weekly humour column for her father’s Lankesh Patrike, to discuss his further contributions. When he asked who was calling, she said, “It’s me, your mother.” He was so impressed by her openness and pluck that he took her to meet his extended family in their rural villages. “She was very innocent, just like a child,” he wrote. “She would not mind going anywhere, meeting anyone and dining with anyone.” On one such visit, Gauri’s drinking and smoking scandalized Gowda’s neighbours. But his aunt was as impressed as he was. “If we have daughters like this, what do we want sons for?” she said. He was the only Lankesh-era writer who stayed with her to the end, writing his column until her very last issue.

Other Lankesh loyalists were repelled by her show of, as they saw it, unearned arrogance and stubbornness. “We did snigger at her,” Pratibha Nandakumar recalls. Within nine months nearly every staffer and writer who’d worked for Lankesh had quit. Circulation plummeted. Longtime readers complained, according to one writer, that “Lankesh’s tabloid has become as weak as his weak-looking daughter.”

The biggest complaint with Gauri’s leadership was that she was barely literate in Kannada, the language of the paper. How could she edit a paper that, in many readers’ minds, had captured that language’s essence? Her entire education had been in English; at her elementary school in Basavanagudi, students were scolded if they spoke in Kannada. In college she failed her Kannada exams twice in a row, and disuse had eroded her skills from there. When she was away from Bangalore, her letters home to her parents were in English. The Times of India’s Bangalore bureau had hired her on the assumption that she, as the daughter of a genius of Kannada, would at least be able to read press releases in the language. She bluffed her way through, passing off the task to a Kannada-fluent colleague. One editor made the mistake of assigning her to cover the World Kannada Conference in Mysore. The speakers’ words “simply flew over my head,” she later wrote.

But as the new editor of Lankesh Patrike, she stopped trying to bluff. Thirty-eight years old, she resolved that she would conquer Kannada once and for all, and she met that resolution with impressive speed. Her new colleagues suggested that, at least at first, she could write her editorials in English, and they’d translate for her. But she refused, and wrote in her clunky Kannada from the very first issue. Within a couple years, she’d improved enough to catch errors that the proof-reader had missed. She took to heart her father’s philosophy that you’ll reach your readers best if you write simply, honestly, and unpretentiously. She’d always been stronger in spoken Kannada, so she wrote as she spoke, colloquially, Rajghatta writes, “in free- flowing street Kannada.”

She was unfailingly frank about her Kannada deficit. “There are several problems in my Kannada even now,” she wrote (in Kannada) in 2013. “Lacking a rich Kannada vocabulary is a major weakness.” Some jeered anyway at her Kannada, and also for how little she knew of her father’s work. She venerated her father, yet at the time of his death she’d read very little of his writing, because so little had been translated into English. She made a crash course of this, too, immersing herself in his columns, a project that revealed to her at last what made his paper so special and deepened her understanding and appreciation of Karnataka and Kannada culture.

• • •

IN AN INTERVIEW IN March 2000—two months after she took over Lankesh Patrike—Gauri was asked bluntly about her new job: “Your critics point out that your career graph has been far from spectacular, and that for the past decade your career has been either stagnating or going downhill. Do you think this was a lucky break for you?” Gauri answered, “I would be the first person to admit that my career was stagnating like nobody’s business. Perhaps it was because I did not want to take risks. Maybe it was because my personal life has not exactly been terrific. I was concentrating more on finding personal happiness than on chasing a career. Today, I am happy with myself, and don’t mind whatever price I have had to pay for it.”

The interviewer asked if she felt able to withstand the threats and insults that any tabloid editor is subject to. “I think being a woman is quite useful in this situation,” Gauri said, “because if any of our reporters met a politician who was angry with my father, the politician would use the foulest language against my father. But if they badmouth a woman, they will lose respect and face in the society themselves! So being a woman is my security right now.”

“Your being a woman may not dissuade them from attacking you physically,” the interviewer replied. “They will know you are particularly vulnerable as you are single and living alone.”

Gauri dismissed it: “I am not afraid of physical attacks at all.”

It didn’t take long for her to kick up controversy. After she published an investigative report on eight powerful Hindu mathas, or monasteries, in the coastal Karnataka city of Udupi, right-wing activists of the Sangh Parivar responded with fury, seizing copies of Lankesh Patrike from newsstands by force and setting them on fire. At an angry rally in a city square, the activists threatened Gauri and her writers as police looked on and took no action.

Like her father, Gauri didn’t hesitate to insult the paper’s friends or even its contributors. The writer Rahamat Tarikere recalls that Gauri had invited him to review a book for the paper. But before he had a chance to do so, a reporter for the paper asked him to comment on a campaign by some Muslim fundamentalists against a fellow member of the Muslim Progressive Writers Forum. Tarikere was slow to respond, so the Lankesh Patrike writer denounced him, in print, as a fundamentalist. He wrote for the paper anyway. Gauri was “blunt, rash, and obstinate,” he wrote after her death. But these qualities, he thought, were balanced by her “simplicity, humaneness, and commitment.”

Lankesh’s legacy loomed over her editorship. She refused to sit at his desk or in his chair; she put her own desk next to his and maintained it like a shrine. Like her father’s, Gauri’s version of Lankesh Patrike accepted no advertisements, mocked the powerful with belittling nicknames, sided unvaryingly with the oppressed, and deplored euphemisms of any kind. But Gauri mostly jettisoned the paper’s literary side. “She had no sense of literature, actually,” her friend Vivek Shanbhag, the novelist, said with a laugh. “Nor did she have people who could help her with that in her paper. So nobody looked to Lankesh Patrike to read a story or a review. That aspect was completely gone.”

More than anything, her friends said, editing the paper radicalized her. After spending much of her adult life removed from Karnataka, she suddenly found herself immersed in its problems: the labour complaints of Bangalore’s municipal sanitation workers, or the persistence of disturbingly retrograde local superstitions such as made snana, wherein “low” caste Hindus roll on the ground over leftover food from a ceremonial meal eaten by Brahmins. (The practice was finally outlawed in Karnataka in 2017.) She took on causes, too, that her father hadn’t concerned himself with, in part by learning from her mistakes. Early in her tenure, one of her reporters wrote a story that was casually derogatory toward transgender people, and Gauri published it. Members of the transgender community sued the paper, and her lawyer, B. T. Venkatesh, took Gauri to meet with them. She came away from the encounter a full-throated defender of their cause forever after. “She was the first woman journalist to support sexual minorities’ movement,” wrote the Bangalore-based transgender activist Akkai. Gauri later published a Kannada translation of the memoirs of the Trans activist A. Revathi and often covered LGBTQ struggles in the paper. The Trans community called her akka, or elder sister. When she died, they were at the forefront of fundraising for the protests in response to her murder.

At first, Gauri held on to traditional ideas of journalistic neutrality. After two decades of inculcation by journalism schools and mainstream-media jobs, she felt that journalism and activism were two realms best kept distinct. Her awakening to activist journalism came on a mountaintop 170 miles west of Bangalore.

• • •

HIGH ON A MOUNTAIN RANGE called Baba Budangiri, in central Karnataka’s Chikmagalur district, there is a shrine in a small cave shrouded by clouds. The mountains are named for Baba Budan, a Muslim Sufi saint who once lived in the shrine. According to one legend, on his return home from taking the hajj pilgrimage to Mecca, Baba Budan exited the Arabian Peninsula with seven raw coffee beans smuggled in his beard, thereby evading the strict export controls that allowed the Arabs to maintain a monopoly on coffee cultivation. Baba Budan planted the beans at home and introduced India to the delights of coffee. But there are so many legends surrounding this cave that it’s impossible to reduce the place to any single uncontradictory spiritual narrative. Some Muslims believe that the shrine began as the home of a direct disciple of Muhammad’s named Hazrat Dada Hayath Meer Khalandar; some Hindus call that same person Dattatreya and believe he was a combined avatar of all three of the paramount gods of Hinduism: Brahma, Shiva, and Vishnu. For centuries, Dada versus Dattatreya wasn’t a debate; the blended legends only enhanced the site’s power for Hindus and Muslims alike.

Inside its tight, dank confines, the cave is crowded with markers of both religions: at one end, several Sufi tombs; at another, a Hindu idol draped with flowers and slathered with mud. The presiding priest is a Muslim who performs traditionally Hindu rituals: lighting the oil lamp, offering puja, blessing each visitor with holy water. The shrine’s official name is Sri Guru Dattatreya Bababudan Swamy Dargah—an amazing mash-up of Hindu and Muslim names and terms.

Hinduism and Islam might look on paper like stark and irreconcilable opposites, but the kind of fusion observable at Baba Budangiri has long been commonplace across India. In Bengal there was Satya Pir, a Muslim holy man who’s also thought to be an avatar of Vishnu. In Varanasi there was the beloved mystic poet Kabir, whose critiques of both Hinduism and Islam led him to a faith that borrowed from both. In Punjab, Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh religion, also took inspiration from both Hindu scriptures and the Quran. But perhaps more than any other region in India, Karnataka proliferates in syncretic sites like Baba Budangiri, where Islam and Hinduism don’t just coexist but converge.

So much of the unique beauty of Hinduism throughout its long history flows from its open-mindedness, its dazzling diversity in practice and devotion and interpretation across the subcontinent. Swami Vivekananda famously declared that Hinduism recognizes all religions as true. Once, when referred to as a Hindu, Mohandas Gandhi said, “I am a Hindu, a Muslim, a Christian, a Parsi, a Jew”; Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the future founder of Pakistan, cracked in response, “Only a Hindu could say that.”

The religion we call Hinduism is extraordinarily multifarious, especially from region to region. In fact, “Hindu” originated as an outsider’s word for Indians that became, under the British, a colonial umbrella term for all the countless non-Abrahamic religious practices, philosophical traditions, and spiritual affiliations of the Indian subcontinent. The idea that there is a religion called “Hinduism” emerged from a foreign occupier’s attempt, out of fear and confusion, to simplify and codify an impossibly diverse constellation of faiths in the subcontinent, to force a Western religious structure onto a spiritual paradigm whose very specialness derives from its complexity and decentralized multiplicity. Unlike any other religion, it has always been wonderfully difficult even to define what Hinduism is in any universally satisfactory way. You can’t call it polytheistic, because there are monotheistic and even atheistic Hindus. There is not a single tenet that all Hindus must believe to be Hindu, nor a single rite that all must perform. This is not to say that Hinduism is at all vague or noncommittal, like a sort of South Asian Unitarian Universalism, but simply that it’s never uniform. At a certain point you just have to surrender to a (fittingly) circular definition: Hinduism is the religion that Hindus practice.

Syncretic sites like Baba Budangiri are the religion’s frontiers, where its porousness is most tangible. In any religion, the policing of such sites is the surest sign of a hard shift toward orthodoxy—toward an attempt to rigidly define. On most days, Baba Budangiri still appears to be quite harmonious. In fact, it’s become the most hotly contested syncretic site in all of Karnataka and the central rallying point for the state’s Hindutva groups. To them, syncretism itself is intolerable, and they chose Baba Budangiri to make an example of.

The trouble began around 1984, when Hindutva activists first organized an event on Baba Budangiri that became a large, festive, and increasingly hostile yearly rally called Dattatreya Jayanti. Soon they were referring to this newly coined practice as a long-held tradition. In the mid-1990s, a time of surging Hindutva activism, the Dattatreya Jayanti expanded and became rowdier, replete with demands to “liberate” the cave from “Muslim control” and vilifications of its Muslim caretaker. Sangh Parivar and BJP leaders in Karnataka began talking about making Baba Budangiri “the Ayodhya of the South.”

The Sangh Parivar had learned in Ayodhya that inflaming communal tensions (or even inventing them outright) was a winning electoral and ideological strategy. The BJP had been looking for a foothold in Karnataka, which it considered its “gateway to the South,” so it was natural that it would seek out a site in which it could provoke interreligious conflict. Baba Budangiri seemed just the place. And the BJP has benefited enormously. Several of Karnataka’s current BJP leaders made their names as Hindutva activists at Baba Budangiri, and the BJP came to dominate Chikmagalur district, which prior to the conflict had long been a Congress Party stronghold.

In the 1990s, Hindutva activists repeatedly attempted to install in the shrine Hindu idols that had previously never been a part of the place, despite a Supreme Court order, issued in light of the agitations, that prohibited all practices at the shrine that did not exist prior to June 1975. (Police took no action in response to any violation of this order.) Led by Sangh Parivar organizations and by the Karnataka-based fringe group Sri Ram Sena, Hindutva activists increasingly vandalized Muslim homes, vehicles, and shops in the area. In 1999, a prominent BJP politician threatened to deploy “suicide squads” to liberate the shrine.

Progressive Kannadigas were increasingly alarmed. A consortium of secular activist organizations called the Bababudangiri Harmony Forum formed to counteract the Hindutva activists, and in October 2001 they asked some local literary celebrities to issue a press statement drawing attention to the worsening climate at the mountain shrine. The first person they asked was Girish Karnad, who immediately agreed and one-upped them: Why don’t we all visit the shrine on a fact-finding mission and hold a press conference there? And he suggested another writer to invite along: Gauri Lankesh. He’d thought of her, he admitted to me, not for her platform or because she was particularly engaged in the issue but simply because he didn’t want the delegation to be entirely male.

Her first impulse was to decline. At that point she’d been editing Lankesh Patrike for nearly two years, and she was so consumed by the work that she felt she couldn’t spare the time. But then, in an impulsive decision that would reroute her life, she changed her mind, and they made the journey up to Baba Budangiri that very day.

When they reached the shrine, Gauri was profoundly moved by its merger of Hindu and Muslim practices. It was a place, she said later, that “uplifts the blueprint of secularism laid out in our constitution. It is a symbol of that very idea.” Likewise, the activists of the Bababudangiri Harmony Forum were impressed by Gauri’s energy and good humor. She’d found her people. It was atop that mountain that she began her transition from “objective” journalist to activist-journalist. “That’s where she flowered,” Girish Karnad told me. “That was the beginning of Gauri Lankesh’s career.” When they came back downhill, Gauri assumed the lead of the delegation’s response. “She handled the press. She called the chief minister and said why don’t you meet us,” one of the Harmony Forum organizers told me. “I wouldn’t have had the guts to ring the chief minister and ask for a meeting, but she did.”

• • •

JUST A FEW MONTHS after Gauri’s first visit to Baba Budangiri came the Gujarat pogrom of 2002. The unchecked violence left Indian Muslims and progressives like Gauri deeply shaken.

India’s 200 million Muslims, who represent approximately 14 percent of India’s total population, are the world’s largest religious minority. There are roughly as many Muslims in India as in Pakistan; Indonesia is the only country in the world with a larger Muslim population. For the past century, Hindutva activists have complained that India, and the Congress Party in particular, has given Indian Muslims preferential treatment—that they are being “appeased.” But by many measures, Muslims are India’s most oppressed minority. In most states Muslims earn on average even less than Dalits. The proportion of Muslims in prestigious positions is far below their proportion in the general population; that’s true in the civil services, the judiciary, the legislature, the universities, and white-collar professions. Muslims are severely underrepresented among government employees, and those who are hired overwhelmingly work at the lowest levels. The numbers are especially stark in the military and intelligence branches, which seem to find India’s Muslims collectively suspicious. Only 2 percent of India’s military is Muslim. There has never been a Muslim officer of the Research and Analysis Wing, the Indian equivalent of the CIA, since its founding in 1968.

Muslim political representation is almost non-existent. No state has a Muslim chief minister, and no Muslim chief minister outside Jammu and Kashmir has ever completed a full term. “Low” caste Hindus have a proportion of reserved legislative seats to counteract discrimination against them; Muslims have none. In 2022, the BJP became the first ruling party in Indian history with not a single Muslim legislator in its ranks: none in the upper house of Parliament, none in the lower house, none in any state. And because the Congress Party fears the BJP accusation that it appeases Muslims, Congress, too, now seldom runs Muslim candidates and rarely even refers to Muslims and their particular problems.

One of those problems is forced ghettoization. Its long been nearly impossible for a Muslim to rent an apartment in many Indian urban neighborhoods. The ghetto neighborhoods Muslims are pushed into are neglected by municipal authorities and tend to lack basic facilities: clean water, schools, parks. Much like the redlining of Black neighborhoods in the United States, Indian banks have been found to mark Muslim neighborhoods as “negative geographical zones” where loans are discouraged. Muslims who live in predominantly Hindu neighborhoods often suffer the most in episodes of religious violence; the aim of a pogrom is to ethnically cleanse. But when Muslims then retreat to the relative safety of a ghetto, Hindutva complains about their aloofness. “Wherever Muslims live, they don’t like to live in co-existence with others, they don’t like to mingle with others,” the BJP Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee said on April 12, 2002— immediately after the Gujarat pogrom.

To Hindutva, Muslims are always one undifferentiated mass, collectively guilty for whatever transgression, real or imagined, that any member of their faith is supposed to have committed, either in the present or in centuries in the past. There are three associations that Hindutva insists on applying to Indian Muslims: the Mughals, Pakistan, and terrorism. Historically speaking, Hindutva has a particular obsession with the Mughals, the Muslim empire that made its first conquest in India in 1526 and rapidly declined after 1707. (They never entirely controlled South India.) In the Hindutva worldview, the Mughals robbed Hindus of a mythical golden age. Hindutva leaders, Modi included, often complain of the centuries of “servitude” that India endured under the Mughals, and heavily imply that contemporary Indian Muslims, by extension, are no better than foreign invaders. The Hindutva version of Mughal history relies heavily on texts authored by the colonial British, who exaggerated the Mughals’ brutality and foreignness so that they could present themselves as liberators. The real history is much more complicated, but it’s irrelevant to how Indian Muslims are treated now.

As for Pakistan, Hindutva assumes that all Muslims are fifth columnists with secret loyalty to the nation’s most hated enemy, traitors unless proven otherwise. “It would be suicidal to delude ourselves into believing that they have turned patriots overnight after the creation of Pakistan,” the Hindutva ideologue M. S. Golwalkar wrote in his most popular book. “On the contrary, the Muslim menace has increased a hundredfold.” In fact, India’s large Muslim population owes itself to the fact that at partition, so many millions of Indian Muslims actively decided against Muslim Pakistan in favour of pluralist India. According to the Hindutva narrative, Indian Muslims spend most of their time plotting to bring down the nation and applauding the Pakistani cricket team. In my own experience, Indian Muslims are much more likely to be busy forwarding goofy Bollywood memes on WhatsApp, like any other Indian. Hindutva wants to paint all Indian Muslims as ignorant fundamentalists and to erase all Muslim contributions to Indian life: not just syncretic sites like Baba Budangiri but also the Taj Mahal, and Muslim movie stars, and the entirety of Urdu culture, with all the exquisite sophistication of its poetry, its music, its manners.

Hindutva activists and politicians often use the word “terrorists” as a synonym for Indian Muslims. There have undoubtedly been horrifying terrorist attacks committed by Muslims on Indian soil (although some of the worst attacks originated from Pakistan). But the threat and scale of terrorism is always, almost by definition, wildly exaggerated. The number of Indians killed in terror attacks is a minuscule fraction of those killed in pogroms, which the terror attacks are typically staged in response to—which is not at all to excuse them but simply to put them in context. And as should be too obvious to say, only an infinitesimal number of Muslims, Indian or Pakistani, have anything to do with terrorism. It’s a wretched cycle: Hindutva tries to force Muslims, already a beleaguered minority, into total submission, and a tiny number of Muslims reacts with impotent and self-defeating acts of sensational violence, which only feeds the Hindutva argument that Muslims need to be forced into submission. Since 2008, the number of terror attacks perpetrated in India by Muslims has sharply declined. But such is the nature of terror attacks that the fear of them lingers long, especially when politicians keep whipping it up.

As soon as Modi took office in 2014, the position of Indian Muslims became palpably more precarious. Lynch mobs murdered scores of Muslims suspected of slaughtering or selling cattle, in supposed defence of the cow as a sacred animal. In 2015, after one of the most notorious of such lynchings, in which a man was slaughtered in his home by neighbours who suspected, inaccurately, that he was storing beef, a BJP politician offered the murderers jobs, and a BJP chief minister invited them to a party rally. In 2018, a Modi cabinet minister garlanded and fed sweets to eight men who’d been convicted of murdering a Muslim meat trader. Modi didn’t say a word about the lynchings for over two years.

• • •

THE VIOLENCE IN GUJARAT pushed Gauri to intensify her involvement at Baba Budangiri, the communal flash point in her own backyard. It was through her enthusiastic adoption of that cause that she met for the first time, in 2002, her loyal friend Shivasundar, who would soon become her closest colleague in her journalism and in her activism. Shivasundar had long experience as an activist, but Gauri was green. “She came across as concerned but very urban educated, a little arrogant, a little dismissive about the kind of activism on the street,” he recalled. But something about Baba Budangiri struck her irrevocably, and she applied herself to the problem with the zeal of a convert. Soon she was not simply reporting on the news from Baba Budangiri but making news, headlining counterdemonstrations, using her office as a protest-planning hub.

“It is no secret that the monkeys of the Bajrang Dal are gearing up to create disruptions at Bababudangiri this year,” Gauri wrote in late 2003, about one of the most aggressive RSS affiliates. Hindutva activists had been hoisting banners at the shrine with threatening phrases: “muscle power,” “streams of blood,” “destroy the enemy.” The atmosphere had grown so heated that the state government banned outdoor gatherings in Chikmagalur, the city nearest to the shrine, in an attempt to prevent mass protests. Gauri was determined to go anyway, and on the way up the mountain she and another activist with the Harmony Forum, an English professor named V. S. Sreedhara, spontaneously got out of the car they were in and hitched a ride in a truck to enter town less conspicuously. “It was a very filmy romantic escapade,” Sreedhara told me. “She said it was like we were eloping. Even in those tense moments she would joke like that.”

Gauri sneaked into town wearing a burqa, then threw it off outside the police station and shouted slogans until she was hauled into custody. Hundreds of other activists were also arrested, and they walked into jail singing anthems in unison. They spent two days massed together in the city’s newly constructed jail. “We inaugurated it,” Shivasundar said with a mischievous grin. They slept on the floor, and drinking water, when it finally arrived, was provided by the jailer in garbage barrels. “But none of these difficulties hurt our confidence or lessened our zeal,” Gauri wrote. “On the contrary, the two days brought us closer together, inspired us to keep up the fight and nourished our spirits…. The jail was indeed like a microcosm of Karnataka. It had young boys and girls, progressive thinkers, communists, Muslim community leaders, artists, journalists, teachers, women activists, farmers’ leaders and politicians from across Karnataka.” Even a handful of Bajrang Dal activists were accidentally arrested along with them. “It looked like they were complete converts to the cause of social harmony after the two-day stay with us,” she wrote. The new issue of Lankesh Patrike had to go to print the night the group was arrested, so she dictated her column from the jail by mobile phone.

While the communal-harmony activists sat in jail, the Hindutva activists held a huge rally, unbothered by the police, and their speeches targeted Gauri and Girish Karnad above all. “Gauri!” crowed Pramod Muthalik, leader of the Sri Ram Sena, as the crowd jeered. “Respected Gauri Lankesh! The police should have left you free. Had they not arrested her, she would have learned the true meaning of harmony. She would have been stripped stark naked and made to stand on top of that hill!”

Among those arrested with Gauri was Agni Sreedhar, the ex-don, whose tabloid Agni was then in its fifth year. He and Gauri had become rival editors, and they’d sometimes make snide oblique remarks about each other in their editorials—especially Gauri, who disdained Sreedhar’s gangster past and scoffed at the idea that he’d reformed. But politically they were largely aligned, especially when it came to promoting communal harmony and opposing the ascendant right wing. (I found a photo of Sreedhar protesting a visit Narendra Modi made to Bangalore in 2013, the year before he was elected prime minister; Sreedhar was holding a sign that read: modi hitler, uo back, uo back.)

Some weeks after their stint in jail, the harmony activists were finally permitted to stage their own mass rally; Sreedhar and Gauri shared the stage. Sreedhar told me very proudly about the speech he gave, in which, as he often does, he leveraged his gangster reputation for dramatic effect. “Now we have only one option,” he told the crowd, which, as he recalls, numbered ten or twenty thousand. “We have to break heads. Are you ready?” The crowd, he said, “became frenzied,” and he kept whipping them up until finally delivering the punch line: “Now I’ll tell you the target: you have to break open your own head.” Then he chastised them for buying into his parody of inflammatory rhetoric. “You were ready to break open someone else’s head. But you’re not ready to open your own mind.”

Building on their growing solidarity after the mass arrest of 2003, secular organizers launched an even larger umbrella group of like-minded activists called the Karnataka Communal Harmony Forum, aimed at easing religious conflict and tackling bigotry wherever they arose in the state. Its membership was a roll call of Karnataka’s progressives. Gauri’s Lankesh Patrike became one of the movement’s most eager platforms.

For all her passionate commitment to communal harmony and angry opposition to bigotry against Muslims, Gauri was never an apologist for conservative Islam. Once a Muslim organization invited her to speak at a large meeting on human rights, and she was miffed when she realized she was the only woman in attendance. Next time, she told the crowd directly, if you don’t bring women in, I won’t come. And from then on the organization included Muslim women in their meetings, too. Prayer baffled her. One activist colleague remembers that when they were arrested on the way to Baba Budangiri, several Muslims were jailed with them, and Gauri was dumbstruck when they got up early to observe the dawn prayer. “She burst out laughing, saying, ‘We are in prison. I can’t understand this religiosity.’ ”

All the same, Gauri once personally translated into Kannada and published a classic text of Sufi Islam: Idries Shah’s Tales of the Dervishes. I asked her friend Mamta Sagar why she might have done so. “It’s easy for us to create the Other out of Muslims because we don’t give them space to say anything,” she said. The void is filled, she said, with a steady patter of negative comments about Muslims: that they’re dirty, they’re violent, they hate Hindus. Gauri was dismayed when one of the greatest Kannada novelists, S. L. Bhyrappa, started writing overtly anti-Muslim novels that became bestsellers. In this context, Sagar said, “bringing in more Islamic references which are positive is important. Maybe that’s why she did it.”

Beginning with Baba Budangiri, the local defense of Indian pluralism became Gauri’s signature cause. “The arrest made her a kind of celebrity,” one activist told me. “From then on she was in demand—every forum, whatever little cause they were fighting, they invited her and she managed to go.” She’d always been opinionated, but it was Baba Budangiri that radicalized her into an unequivocal leftist—even if her brand of leftism always remained a bit vague—and an unabashed activist, positions that she immediately reflected in the pages of Lankesh Patrike. She liked to say that she had three children: her niece Esha, her newspaper, and the Communal Harmony Forum.

(Parts two, three and four of more excerpts from the book to be also published at intervals)

Note from the Editors: We would like to express our heartfelt solidarity with the family of Gauri Lankesh, Indira Lankesh, Kavitha and Esha Laneksh, who have with pathos and determination built on the gaping vacuum created by Gauri Lankesh’s assassination. Gauri was also a close a dear activist friend of Sabrangindia’s co-editor, Teesta Setalvad.

Related:

Storms battered her from outside, but she stood, an unwavering flame: Gauri Lankesh

Honour for killers of Gauri Lankesh and MM Kalburgi in Karnataka, public felicitation and terms like “Hindu tigers” for accused Amit Baddi and Ganesh…

Protest in Karnataka as activists condemns felicitation of Gauri Lankesh murder accused by right-wing groups

Murderers or Martyrs? The dangerous glorification of murdered Gauri Lankesh’s accused by Hindutva groups

Gauri Lankesh assassination: 6 years down, no closure for family and friends, justice elusive

The post The emergence of Gauri Lankesh, a fiery no-nonsense editor in Kannada appeared first on SabrangIndia.

*Gauri*

Shivasundar

When shadows thickened

and the world seemed smothered in night,

she caught fire—

burning through the dark

until she became light itself.

When the heat of the street

melted the cold within,

she rose,

shaped by compassion

that refused to be contained.

Storms battered her from outside,

whirlwinds tore at her within,

yet she stood,

a small unwavering flame

that would not go out.

She did not trim truth

to fit convenience.

She walked with the street,

stood among the people,

and became their lamp.

She guarded the hushed voices

of conscience,

listened to the secret murmur

of the self,

and in knowing herself,

she helped us know who we are.

She saw red inside blue,

blue inside red,

embers glowing in black,

an open sky shining through white.

She wove these colors together

and became the rainbow.

Related:

Murder of Gauri Lankesh a hate crime against humanity, condemn release on bail of 8 accused: ALIFA Open letter

Gauri Lankesh assassination: 6 years down, no closure for family and friends, justice elusive

Remembering Gauri Lankesh, Renewing A Pledge

The post Storms battered her from outside, but she stood, an unwavering flame: Gauri Lankesh appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Baddi and Miskin, who are currently facing trial for their involvement in these targeted assassinations, later paid visits to the Siddharoodha Matha and Moorusavira Matha, reinforcing their alignment with right-wing religious factions. In a further sign of institutional complicity, banners hailing them as “Hindu tigers” were put up in parts of Hubballi, including near the Tulaja Bhavani temple, before temple authorities belatedly removed them.

A video of the celebration and felicitation may be viewed here:

This grotesque celebration of accused murderers is not an isolated incident. It reflects a broader and deeply troubling pattern within Hindutva extremist circles—one in which individuals who have committed or are accused of committing heinous crimes, including murder, rape, and lynching, are glorified as warriors of their cause rather than held accountable for their actions.

From killers to heroes

The public honouring of Baddi and Miskin comes just months after a similarly shocking episode in October 2024, when two other key accused in the Gauri Lankesh murder—Parashuram Waghmore and Manohar Yadave—were greeted as heroes upon their release from prison. After being granted bail by a Bengaluru sessions court on October 9, 2024, the two men were received in their hometown of Vijayapura with garlands, celebratory chants, and processions organised by the far-right group Sri Rama Sene.

At the centre of this spectacle was Umesh Vandal, a Sri Rama Sene leader who presided over the event as Waghmore and Yadave were draped in saffron shawls and welcomed like returning soldiers. The accused killers, far from showing remorse, went on to publicly pay homage to a statue of Shivaji, a move designed to project themselves as Hindutva warriors fighting a righteous battle. Videos of the event circulated widely on social media, triggering outrage among civil society groups, but drawing no meaningful condemnation from the political establishment.

Adding to the alarming trend, another accused in the Gauri Lankesh murder case, Shrikant Pangarkar, was inducted into the Shiv Sena faction led by Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on October 19, 2024. Pangarkar, a former Maharashtra corporator, had been arrested in 2018 for his role in the assassination conspiracy but was granted bail by the Karnataka High Court in September 2024. The Shiv Sena’s decision to welcome him into its ranks ahead of the Maharashtra assembly elections sparked public outrage, forcing CM Shinde to hurriedly declare the appointment “null and void”—a mere face-saving exercise rather than a principled stand against extremism.

The public felicitations of both the accused in the Bilkis Bano case and the Gauri Lankesh murder case reveal a disturbing pattern of glorifying individuals involved in heinous crimes, particularly those targeting women. In the Bilkis Bano case, the eleven convicts who were responsible for the gang rape and mass murder during the 2002 Gujarat riots were released early and celebrated by right-wing groups, sending a chilling message of impunity for sexual violence against women. Similarly, the accused in the brutal murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh, a prominent woman who fearlessly challenged the forces of Hindutva, were honoured in a manner that undermines the seriousness of the crime. Both cases highlight how violence against women—whether in the form of sexual assault or political assassination—has been co-opted by extremist factions to advance their divisive agendas, while the state’s failure to hold the perpetrators accountable sends a dangerous message about the erosion of justice and respect for women in India. The glorification of such criminals not only trivialises the suffering of the victims but also emboldens future acts of gender-based violence and political murder.

The Gauri Lankesh case: A murder that exposed a network of hate

The killing of journalist Gauri Lankesh in 2017 was not an isolated act of violence. It was part of a calculated campaign against dissenters, rationalists, and progressive voices who dared to challenge Hindutva supremacy. Lankesh, a fearless journalist, was gunned down outside her home in Bengaluru on September 5, 2017, a brutal assassination that sent shockwaves across India.

The Karnataka Police’s Special Investigation Team (SIT) eventually arrested 17 individuals, all linked to the extremist outfit Sanatan Sanstha, revealing a vast network of Hindutva militants operating across multiple states. The investigation found that Waghmore was the shooter, with Miskin as the getaway driver. Their case, like that of many others charged with politically motivated killings, has been dragged out in court, leading to bail for several accused on procedural grounds.

The SIT uncovered further links between the Gauri Lankesh murder and other high-profile assassinations of rationalists, including MM Kalburgi, Govind Pansare, and Narendra Dabholkar. These killings form part of an ideological crusade in which Hindutva extremists systematically target voices that oppose their radical vision of Hindu nationalism.

While legal proceedings remain ongoing, the celebration of the accused makes it clear that for their supporters, these men are not criminals—they are ideological foot soldiers in a war against secularism and rational thought.

A systemic pattern: Hindutva’s hero worship of convicted criminals

The glorification of murder accused in Karnataka is not an aberration—it is part of a well-documented pattern of Hindutva forces celebrating individuals involved in communal violence, sexual violence, and hate crimes.

• 2022: Bilkis Bano Case (Gujarat) – Eleven convicts in the gang-rape and mass murder case were released early and garlanded in Godhra by RSS member Arvind Sisodia, signalling approval of anti-Muslim violence.
• 2020: Bulandshahr Mob Violence (Uttar Pradesh) – Shikhar Agarwal, accused in the mob killing of police officer Subodh Kumar Singh, was honoured by BJP’s Bulandshahr president Anil Sisodia, reinforcing political protection for rioters.
• 2019: Bulandshahr Lynching Case (Uttar Pradesh) – Seven accused in Inspector Singh’s lynching received a hero’s welcome from Bajrang Dal, VHP, and right-wing groups, legitimising vigilantism.
• 2018: Gujarat Pogrom Planner Honoured (Gujarat) – Keka Shastry, a VHP leader who admitted to planning the 2002 Gujarat carnage, was felicitated and praised by BJP leaders, showcasing open endorsement of communal violence.
• 2018: Ajmer Dargah Blast Convict Welcomed (Gujarat) – Bhavesh Patel, convicted in the 2007 Ajmer Dargah blast, was given a grand celebration by BJP and VHP, normalising Hindutva-led terrorism.
• 2018: Minister Felicitates Lynching Convicts (Jharkhand) – Union Minister Jayant Sinha garlanded eight men convicted of lynching coal trader Alimuddin Ansari, highlighting state complicity in mob violence.
• 2018: Kathua Rape Case Protests (Jammu) – BJP leaders and Hindu Ekta Manch members organised rallies in support of men accused of the gang rape and murder of an eight-year-old girl, exposing the communalisation of sexual violence.
• 2013: Muzaffarnagar Riots Accused Honoured (Uttar Pradesh) – BJP’s ‘Human Rights Cell’ felicitated Sangeet Som and Suresh Rana, accused of inciting communal riots that killed over 60 people and displaced thousands.
• 2018: Giriraj Singh Backs Riot-Accused (Bihar) – Union Minister Giriraj Singh visited Bajrang Dal and VHP members jailed for communal riots, portraying them as victims of political persecution.
• 2014: Hindutva Bravery Award for Murder Accused (Maharashtra) – Hindutva groups planned to honour Dhananjay Desai, Hindu Rashtra Sena leader accused of murdering Pune techie Mohsin Sheikh, reinforcing the veneration of violent extremists.

From political patronage to social media glorification, the infrastructure of Hindutva extremism ensures that those who commit violence against minorities, journalists, and rationalists are not just shielded but celebrated. The repeated public honouring of individuals accused or convicted of such crimes is not merely a law-and-order issue; it is a fundamental challenge to the fabric of Indian democracy.

The danger of normalising hate

The message sent by these acts of public glorification is clear: in today’s India, those who commit violence in the name of Hindutva are not just protected—they are exalted. By treating rapists, lynchers, and murderers as heroes, both convicted and accused, the Hindutva ecosystem is ensuring that such crimes will not only continue but will be carried out with even greater impunity.

The failure of the state to curb these displays of hate is a tacit endorsement of the growing culture of extremist violence. With each celebration of hate criminals, Hindutva forces are further emboldened, deepening the assault on secularism, diversity, and democracy itself. The question now is not just about whether justice will be served in individual cases—it is about whether India can still call itself a nation governed by the rule of law, or whether it has fully embraced mob rule in the name of Hindutva.

Related:

Bilkis Bano Case: Supreme Court strikes down remission for gang rape and murder convicts, citing flagrant violation of rule of law

Bilkis Bano gang rape convict shares stage with BJP MP, MLA: Gujarat

Remembering Gauri Lankesh, Renewing A Pledge

The post Honour for killers of Gauri Lankesh and MM Kalburgi in Karnataka, public felicitation and terms like “Hindu tigers” for accused Amit Baddi and Ganesh Miskin appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The protesters strongly objected to the celebration of the accused, stating, “The act of honouring those accused of murder is tantamount to endorsing the crime itself.” They urged Karnataka’s Home Minister to take legal action against the individuals involved in organising the felicitation and ensure that those responsible for the murder face swift justice. In their memorandum to the Home Minister, they emphasised the urgency of prosecuting the accused, condemning the glorification of criminals.

The protest also drew parallels to similar incidents, such as the honouring of individuals convicted in the Bilkis Bano case, raising concerns about a growing trend of celebrating those who commit violent acts. 

Kavita Lankesh and others decry glorification of accused:

Kavita Lankesh, sister of Gauri Lankesh, expressed shock and anguish over the recent events, describing the glorification of her sister’s alleged killers as deeply “disturbing.” Speaking to The Quint, she expressed frustration over the delays in the judicial process, which have allowed the accused to secure bail. “Our family has suffered enough, and now we must witness those responsible for Gauri’s death being honored,” she had said. Kavita revealed plans to meet with Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah to demand the formation of a special or fast-track court to handle her sister’s case.

She added that the investigation into Gauri’s murder had initially progressed under Siddaramaiah’s previous tenure as chief minister, with 100 people assigned to the case. However, delays in prosecution, combined with the recent release of the accused, have left her questioning the effectiveness of the legal system. “If there is no follow-up, what is the purpose of the investigation? The case is being jeopardised, and justice delayed is justice denied,” she stressed.

Reflecting on the slow progress of justice, Kavitha pointed out that while everyone accused in the case has been granted bail, her primary concern is the delay in the legal proceedings. Although she does not oppose the bail as part of the ongoing trial, she firmly believes that the extensive delay is jeopardising the case and allowing the accused to walk free. For her, this protracted legal process is undermining the significance of the investigation.

Determined to expedite the trial, Kavitha Lankesh revealed her plans to meet Chief Minister Siddaramaiah personally, urging him to take decisive steps to prevent further delays. She intends to request the establishment of a special or fast-track court to handle Gauri’s case, ensuring that justice is served swiftly and that the accused do not escape due process.

Kavitha Lankesh expressed profound anguish and disbelief over the recent felicitation of her sister’s alleged killers, Parashuram Waghmore and Manohar Edave, by right-wing Hindutva groups in Karnataka. She described the glorification of these individuals as “disturbing and shocking,” not only to her family but also to society at large. She emphasised that honouring her sister’s alleged killers is not just an insult to her family, but also to the legacy of Gauri Lankesh and the progressive values she stood for.

Kavitha also expressed her shock at how Karnataka, a state that has long stood for progressive values and human dignity, is now witnessing the glorification of individuals accused of heinous crimes. She drew parallels between this incident and others across India where rapists and murderers have been similarly honoured, such as those involved in the Bilkis Bano case in Gujarat. For her, the fact that this is happening in Karnataka is particularly distressing and serves as a blot on the state’s reputation.

In her statement, Kavitha Lankesh made it clear that the public celebration of individuals accused of murder is not just a personal affront but a societal danger. She urged the state government, particularly the Home Minister of Karnataka, to take strict legal action against those who organised the felicitation, accusing them of instigating violence and supporting murderers.
 

Protesters denounce broader trend of felicitating criminals

Members of the Veerashaiva Lingayat Coordination Committee and other progressive thinkers also staged a separate protest in Bengaluru on October 18, condemning the public support given to those accused in the murders of both Gauri Lankesh and scholar M M Kalburgi. The protestors also highlighted broader concerns over a growing trend of glorifying criminals, citing instances in states like Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh where convicted rapists and murderers have been celebrated. Members of ‘Eddelu Karnataka,’ a civil society group, submitted a memorandum to the Karnataka Home Minister condemning the recent events. The group emphasised that such actions tarnish the state’s long-standing reputation for upholding human values and called for legal action against those promoting violence.

In particular, they urged the government to expedite the trial of Gauri Lankesh’s murder and punish the guilty. They condemned the “felicitating of killers” as a blot on Karnataka’s social fabric, asserting that it goes against the state’s ethos of peace and justice. Prominent figures, former minister B T Lalitha Naik, former MLC Mohan Kondajji, activists K S Vimala, K R Subhash, and members of the Dalit Sangharsh Samiti, were among the protestors.

Shrikant Pangarkar’s controversial political appointment sparks outrage

In a related development, Shrikant Pangarkar, another accused in the Gauri Lankesh murder case, joined the Shiv Sena faction led by Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde on October 19, 2024. His appointment ahead of the Maharashtra assembly elections sparked outrage, with opposition leaders condemning the move as a stain on the state’s governance.

However, on October 20, CM Eknath Shinde had to stay the appointment of Shrikant Pangarkar. This decision came amid criticism from opposition parties slamming Pangarkar’s re-entry into the party. A statement from the Shiv Sena on Sunday clarified that if Pangarkar had been appointed to any party post in the district, the decision has now been stayed.

Maharashtra Pradesh Congress Committee President Nana Patole sharply criticised the ruling coalition, stating, “The inclusion of Pangarkar, an accused in Gauri Lankesh’s murder, is a disgrace and tarnishes the state’s image.” Congress spokesperson Shama Mohamed and NCP MP Supriya Sule also expressed their dismay, with Sule stating, “The government has sanctified a criminal, signaling a breakdown of law and order in Maharashtra.”

गद्दारांना आरोपींची साथ!

पत्रकार गौरी लंकेश यांच्या हत्येमध्ये संशयित असलेले श्रीकांत पांगारकरने विधानसभा निवडणुकीच्या पार्श्वभूमीवर एकनाथ शिंदे यांच्या शिवसेना गटात केलेला प्रवेश म्हणजे ‘उंदराला मांजर साक्ष’ असा प्रकार आहे.

श्रीकांत पांगारकरने तीन संशयित हिंदुत्ववादी…

— Nana Patole (@NANA_PATOLE) October 20, 2024

Shrikant Pangarkar, accused in the Gauri Lankesh murder case, has joined the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena, which is running the Maharashtra government in alliance with BJP and under PM @narendramodi Ji.

Why do all corrupts, murderers, and rapists seem to find BJP and its…

— Dr. Shama Mohamed (@drshamamohd) October 20, 2024

अतिशय धक्कादायक ! गुन्हेगारांना सामाजीक प्रतिष्ठा प्राप्त करुन देण्यात खुद्द मावळते मुख्यमंत्री आणि त्यांचा पक्ष आघाडीवर आहे. या राज्यात कायदा आणि सुव्यवस्थेचे तीन तेरा का वाजले याच्या काही कारणांपैकी हे एक प्रमुख कारण…! प्रख्यात पत्रकार गौरी लंकेश यांच्या मारेकऱ्याला खोके…

— Supriya Sule (@supriya_sule) October 20, 2024

According to India Today, Shrikant was part of the undivided Shiv Sena until 2006. In 2011, after the Shiv Sena reportedly denied him a ticket to contest elections, he joined the Hindu Janajagruti Samit, where he met co-conspirators in Gauri’s murder. Pangarkar had previously been arrested by the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) in 2018 for possessing arms and explosives. He was linked to a right-wing extremist network responsible for planning attacks on cultural events and individuals deemed enemies of Hindutva ideology. 

According to the chargesheet filed in the Kavitha Lankesh murder case, Shrikant Pangarkar briefed all the accused on the precautions they were to undertake before, during, and after the murder. He also gave them legal training and told them what to do in case they got caught. Bharat Kurane bought Ganesh Miskin and Parashuram Waghmore the clothes they would use for the murder.

Although his appointment to the Shiv Sena was stayed amid public backlash, the episode has further fuelled criticism of the ruling government for allegedly providing a safe haven for extremists and criminals.

This recent sequence of events has intensified calls for greater accountability and justice, not only for Gauri Lankesh but also for all victims of politically motivated violence.

Related:

Murderers or Martyrs? The dangerous glorification of murdered Gauri Lankesh’s accused by Hindutva groups

Murder of Gauri Lankesh a hate crime against humanity, condemn release on bail of 8 accused: ALIFA Open letter

Gauri Lankesh assassination: 6 years down, no closure for family and friends, justice elusive

The Hasdeo Arand crisis: Tribal protesters face brutal state crackdown while standing against felling of trees

The post Protest in Karnataka as activists condemns felicitation of Gauri Lankesh murder accused by right-wing groups appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Two individuals accused in the murder of journalist #GauriLankesh have been granted bail, sparking significant reactions upon their arrival in #Vijayapura, #Karnataka.

Upon their return, they were greeted with a rousing welcome by various #Hindutva organizations, who expressed… pic.twitter.com/1PznLHwHQ8

— Hate Detector (@HateDetectors) October 12, 2024

In a chilling display of triumphalism, both men were garlanded, draped in orange shawls, and hailed as heroes upon their return to Vijayapura. The celebration, as documented by India Today, was not an isolated incident. It follows a familiar pattern where individuals accused of gruesome violence, especially those whose actions align with a particular ideological bent, are transformed into icons of a skewed form of nationalism. The two accused, after their ceremonial reception, garlanded a statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji and visited a local temple—a symbolic and strategic move to anchor their actions in a narrative of religious duty.

This grotesque celebration echoes a long-standing practice of far-right groups in India: the glorification of vigilante violence. The message is clear—those who engage in acts of hatred, violence, or murder under the banner of Hindutva are to be valorised. Waghmore, a known activist of Sri Ram Sene, a right-wing group notorious for stoking communal tensions in Karnataka, is just the latest in a line of individuals whose crimes are recast as acts of heroism. The timing of this felicitation, coinciding with the Hindu festival of Vijayadasami, added an even more sinister layer of religious and cultural justification to the spectacle.

Gauri Lankesh’s murderers, cowards who shot a lady and ran away, are garlanded with Saffron clothes.

Saffron represents courage and sacrifice, not crime and cowardice. Right wing is destroying Hinduism piece by piece. pic.twitter.com/xgLXcAJe1z

— Congress Kerala (@INCKerala) October 14, 2024

The Congress has strongly condemned the actions of Hindutva groups in Karnataka, who recently celebrated the release of two men accused of the brutal murder of journalist and Hindutva critic, Gauri Lankesh. In a scathing post on X (formerly Twitter), the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) shared a video showing the accused, Parashuram Waghmore and Manohar Edave, being garlanded and draped in saffron clothes upon their return to Vijaypura.

The KPCC lashed out at the disturbing symbolism of saffron—traditionally a colour representing courage and sacrifice—being co-opted to honour individuals accused of such a cowardly act. “Gauri Lankesh’s murderers, cowards who shot a lady and ran away, are garlanded with saffron clothes,” the post stated, sharply criticising the right-wing’s perversion of Hindu values.

By linking the incident to a broader issue, the Congress underscored the damage that extremist groups are doing to Hinduism itself, a religion that most relate to non-violence and tolerance. “Right wing is destroying Hinduism piece by piece,” the KPCC’s post noted, calling out the hypocrisy of those who glorify violence while claiming to represent the faith’s highest ideals. The felicitation of accused criminals not only mocks the justice system but also distorts the cultural and spiritual heritage of Hinduism by equating its symbols with acts of violence and hatred.

Kavitha Lankesh, sister of Gauri Lankesh, also spoke out on the said incident, deeming it to be a vile and vicious attempt at creating a dangerous environment.

Gauri Lankesh Murder Case | “Even in Bilkis Bano’s case, the rapists were given a rousing welcome. Gauri case was an organized crime where a lot of people were involved..”-Kavitha Lankesh, Sister of Gauri Lankesh#ReporterDiary #GauriLankesh (@anaghakesav) pic.twitter.com/ldkwUC8BhY

— IndiaToday (@IndiaToday) October 14, 2024

But this is not a one-off event. India has seen multiple instances where individuals accused of communal violence or crimes against minorities have been given similar receptions. Whether it was the 2018 garlanding of eight men convicted of lynching a Muslim man in Jharkhand or the celebration of those convicted in the 2002 Gujarat riots after their early release, there is a clear, unsettling trend. These actions feed into a dangerous narrative of impunity, where the perpetrators of violence are not just forgiven—they are celebrated, and their actions justified under the guise of religious nationalism.

The broader implications of such actions cannot be understated. By turning accused murderers into martyrs of a cause, these groups send a dangerous signal: violence committed in the name of ideology is acceptable, even laudable. It emboldens more violence, deepens communal divides, and erodes the principles of justice and accountability. The case of Gauri Lankesh – an outspoken critic of right-wing politics, shot dead outside her home in 2017—remains a stark reminder of the price paid for dissent in today’s India.

As the trial in the Gauri Lankesh murder case drags on, and more accused individuals are released on bail, the question that looms large is this: when the state apparatus is manipulated to embolden those who commit violence under the guise of ideology, where does justice find a place?

Below is a brief overview of various instances, year-wise, where accused and convicted individuals in high-profile crimes were felicitated by far-right extremist organisations while they were accused or convicted of crimes:

2024: Gauri Shankar Murder Case Lawyers Felicitated (Karnataka)  

Event:   On July 1, 2024, BJP MLA Raja Singh felicitated the advocates defending the accused in the Gauri Shankar murder case at an event organised by HJS.

Organisers:   The accused’s lawyers, including P. Krishnamurthy, Umashankar Megundi, and others, were honoured, and Raja Singh also felicitated lawyers defending the accused in the Dabholkar murder case.

Significance: The celebration of legal defenders in such sensitive cases signals the normalisation of extremism and further erodes the justice process.

2024 – Gauri Lankesh murder accused felicitated (Karnataka)  

Event:   In July 2024, Parashuram Waghmore and Manohar Edave, accused in the murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh, were felicitated in Vijaypura, Karnataka, by Hindutva groups.

Organisers: Hindutva organisations, including Hindu Janajagruti Samiti (HJS), organised the event where the accused were garlanded in saffron robes.

Significance: Gauri Lankesh’s murder in 2017, allegedly due to her outspoken criticism of Hindutva ideology, became a focal point for debates on religious extremism. Felicitating the accused further exacerbates concerns about the growing glorification of violence.

2024 – Dabholkar murder accused felicitated (Goa)

Event: Vikram Bhave, a Sanatan Sanstha seeker acquitted in the murder of rationalist Dr. Narendra Dabholkar, along with defence lawyers, was felicitated on June 30, 2024, at an event organised by the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti (HJS) in Ponda, Goa.

Organisers: The HJS hosted the event as part of the Vaishvik Hindu Rashtra Mahotsav, attended by national and international delegates.

Significance: Dabholkar was a prominent rationalist and social activist, and his murder is linked to extremist religious elements. The felicitation of those involved undermines efforts for justice.

2022 – Bilkis Bano convicts felicitated after premature release (Gujarat)  

Event: Convicts in the Bilkis Bano case, where 11 men were sentenced to life imprisonment for gang-raping Bilkis Bano and murdering 14 of her relatives during the 2002 Gujarat riots, were felicitated soon after their premature release on August 15, 2022.

Organisers: The felicitation was reportedly organised by Arvind Sisodia, a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), in Godhra. Convicts were greeted with garlands and sweets at an event in the Deen Dayal Upadhyay Trust auditorium.

Significance:  Despite a Supreme Court conviction, the event sparked outrage as it symbolised the glorification of individuals guilty of heinous crimes, including gang-rape and murder during communal violence.

2020: Bulandshahr violence accused felicitated (Uttar Pradesh)  

Event: Shikhar Agarwal, the key accused in the 2018 Bulandshahr violence case where Inspector Subodh Kumar Singh was killed by a mob, was felicitated on July 14, 2020.

Organisers: He was allegedly felicitated by Bulandshahr BJP president Anil Sisodia and awarded responsibilities for overseeing welfare schemes in the district.

Significance: This sparked controversy, as the felicitation of someone accused of killing a police officer in a communal violence case was seen as an endorsement of lawlessness.

2019: Mob lynching accused in Bulandshahr felicitated (Uttar Pradesh)   

Event: After being granted bail, seven men accused of killing police officer Subodh Kumar Singh during a mob attack in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh, were given a hero’s welcome. Supporters greeted them with garlands and chanted slogans.

Organiser: Bajrang Dal, VHP, and local right-wing groups in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh.

Significance: The public celebration of men accused of killing a police officer in the name of cow protection is another instance of glorifying violence. This not only emboldens vigilante groups but also undermines law enforcement efforts to contain communal violence.

2018: Gujarat carnage – Keka Shastry felicitation (Gujarat)

Event: Felicitation of Keka Shastry, a VHP leader who admitted involvement in planning the 2002 Gujarat carnage.

Organiser: Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP)

Significance: Despite Shastry’s admission of his role in orchestrating violence that claimed over 2,000 lives, top BJP and Sangh Parivar leaders, including Narendra Modi and L.K. Advani, praised him at the event, showcasing the impunity and open acceptance of violence against minorities within these circles.

2018: Ajmer Dargah bomb blast convict Bhavesh Patel felicitation (Gujarat)

Event: Bhavesh Patel, convicted in the 2007 Ajmer Dargah bomb blast case, was welcomed with a grand celebration.

Organiser: BJP and Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP)

Significance: Patel was involved in a terror attack targeting the Ajmer Sharif Dargah, which killed three and injured 17. His public felicitation by BJP and VHP leaders, with people throwing rose petals on him, signified the glorification of violence against Muslims and the normalisation of terrorism in Hindutva supremacist circles.

2018: Union Minister Jayant Sinha felicitates lynching convicts (Jharkhand)  

Event: Union Minister Jayant Sinha garlanded eight men convicted in the lynching of coal trader Alimuddin Ansari after they were released on bail. The men were convicted of murdering Ansari in a case of cow vigilantism.

Organiser: Jayant Sinha, Union Minister of State for Civil Aviation, at his residence in Hazaribagh, Jharkhand.

Significance: Sinha’s public show of support for convicted lynching perpetrators triggered outrage, highlighting the tacit approval and political backing for communal violence in the name of cow protection. Despite widespread criticism, Sinha defended his actions as “honouring the law,” revealing how legal processes are used to justify extremist acts.

2018: Rallies in support of gang rape accused in Kathua Rape case (Jammu)

Event: Rallies were held in support of the accused in the brutal gang rape and murder of an 8-year-old girl in Kathua, Jammu and Kashmir. BJP leaders and members of the Hindu Ekta Manch publicly protested the arrest of the accused.

Organiser: Hindu Ekta Manch, with participation from local BJP leaders and ministers.

Significance: The public backing of the accused in such a heinous crime reflects how communal biases drive support for perpetrators of violence against minorities. The participation of BJP leaders in these rallies demonstrates the politicisation of communal violence and its integration into electoral strategies.

2013: Muzaffarnagar riots accused Sangeet Som and Suresh Rana felicitation (Uttar Pradesh)

Event: Felicitation of Sangeet Som and Suresh Rana, accused of inciting communal violence in the 2013 Muzaffarnagar riots.

Organiser: ‘Human Rights Cell’ of the Uttar Pradesh BJP

Significance: The Muzaffarnagar riots led to over 60 deaths and the displacement of more than 40,000 people, mostly Muslims. BJP’s public honouring of these accused individuals as heroes at the then Gujarat CM Narendra Modi rally symbolised the political backing for those who instigate communal violence.

2018: Giriraj Singh meets riot-accused Bajrang Dal and VHP members (Bihar)  

Event: Union Minister Giriraj Singh visited Bajrang Dal and VHP activists jailed for rioting during Ram Navami celebrations in 2017. Singh expressed grief over their arrests, claiming they were framed.

Organiser: Giriraj Singh, Union Minister, at Nawada jail, Bihar.

Significance: Singh’s defence of accused rioters reflects the pattern of political leaders supporting right-wing groups involved in communal violence. By blaming the Nitish Kumar government for “suppressing Hindus,” Singh’s actions serve to embolden Hindutva elements and promote a narrative that demonises minorities.

2014: Dhananjay Desai to be honoured with Hindutva Bravery Award (Maharashtra)   

Event: Hindutva groups announced plans to award Dhananjay Desai, the chief of Hindu Rashtra Sena (HRS), with the ‘Hindutva Shaurya Puraskar’ despite his arrest for the murder of Pune techie Mohsin Sheikh. 

Organiser: Akhil Bharateeya Krushi Gou-Seva Sangh, with support from local Hindutva organisations in Pune, Maharashtra.

Significance: The announcement of Desai’s award exemplifies how right-wing extremist leaders are venerated despite being accused of heinous crimes. The decision to honour Desai for his contributions to Hindutva, not his role in the murder, highlights the political backing of anti-Muslim violence and the normalisation of such acts.

Celebrating the unthinkable: The normalisation of extremism

In conclusion, the recent celebration of Gauri Lankesh’s murderers reflects a disturbing trend that transcends regional boundaries in India. The glorification of individuals accused of heinous crimes—especially those that align with extremist ideologies—reveals a deeper societal malaise where violence and hatred are increasingly normalised. This behaviour not only undermines the justice system but also fosters a culture of impunity that threatens the very foundations of democracy, free expression, and accountability across the country. As incidents like these continue to proliferate, it is imperative for civil society, political leaders, and the judiciary to unite in their resolve to confront and counteract the rise of extremism. Upholding the legacy of activists like Gauri Lankesh demands a collective commitment to justice, equality, and the protection of fundamental rights for all citizens, regardless of their beliefs or affiliations. Only through such efforts can we hope to dismantle the dangerous narratives that seek to legitimise violence and division within our society.

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The post Murderers or Martyrs? The dangerous glorification of murdered Gauri Lankesh’s accused by Hindutva groups appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Text of the Open Letter:

“Open Letter from ALIFA to dear Gauri Lankesh, marking 7 years of her cowardly killing: 

Long Live the Eternal Feminist, Anti-Fascist Fire and Flower Gauri!

Gauri, dear sister, dear comrade!

‘It has been seven years. We still remember the day, the night! September 5, 2017 – in fact the very moments – when the ‘news’ hit us. Gauri Lankesh shot in cold blood. Details poured in. Number of bullets. At your residence. By two men. We reeled with shock under immeasurable grief, loss and helplessness. Abandoning so many unfinished conversations, you left a void in all our hearts, the shape and size of a star!

‘Soon the city, the state, people from across the country joined in this mourning of the many, many Gauris we knew, admired, debated with, and loved. Loved dearly, fiercely. Not just the strong feminist, the fearless anti-fascist journalist, the inspirational mentor, the bold publisher and the fearless activist. But also, the vibrant, witty, unconventional, strong yet vulnerable woman you were.

‘We write today to not remember that one dreadful moment of your death, but celebrate the vital life force you were and continue to be – inspiring all who knew and those who did not, to continue resisting those lifeless forces that took you away from us. We write also to condemn the release of eight of the accused just a day before the seventh anniversary of your murder – indicative of a State machinery that is becoming increasingly communalised and callous at worst, and inept at best while legitimising impunity and injustice at the highest levels.

‘We were relieved when the law-and-order system actually did its job, investigating and arresting 17 people including the two assassins, Parashuram Waghmore, 26, a former member of the Sri Rama Sena in Bijapur, and Ganesh Miskin, 27, a right-wing activist from Hubbali. The trial too began in July 2022. All were linked to extremist Hindutva groups who created a syndicate to carry out killings and attacks on its critics – primarily in Karnataka and Maharashtra, between 2013 and 2018. This included the equally remarkable and inspiring Dabholkar, Pansare and Kalburgi who lived and died defending the faith of freedom, justice and rationality.

‘The members of this organisation targeted persons who they identified to be inimical to their belief and ideology. The members strictly followed the guidelines and principles mentioned in Kshatra Dharma Sadhana, a book published by Sanatan Sanstha,” the SIT said after it filed a chargesheet against the accused in the case on 23rd November, 2018.

‘Many of your friends, family and comrades went and sat in the Courts on the days of the trial to look at the accused in their faces and show them that your spirit of defiance still lived – fearless and free. They sat there to show up how shallow the convictions of your killers were. And how frivolous their desperate attempts to prove the ‘kshatra’ or ‘masculinity’ of their fight by killing a spirited woman like you. With the last of the veils dropped, exposing the murderous monstrosity that drove your killers, it has only been made clear how low they can stoop. Their project of Hindutva fascism, the framing of you, Gauri Lankesh, as a ‘Durjan’, turned around in their faces, in the cheapest slapstick way. You would agree – the joke is on them!

‘We could see you too sitting in the trial, lighting up your cigarette and laughing out at their cowardice! For don’t forget we loved you also for your happy irreverence. We delighted in learning from you that political humour was always more nuanced than a simple struggle between repression and resistance. Like Serge said, “Repression can only live off fear and only intimidates the weak. It exasperates the best and tempers the resolution of the strongest!”

‘And you were anything but weak. You remained strong in life and after life. For what has lived on despite their attempts to kill you is your indomitable courage. Despite the threats, the imminent possibility of death, the continual attempts to silence you and everything you represented, you knew where you stood and always had the courage to stand your ground. You continued to create spaces for asking ‘uncomfortable, irreverent’ questions and holding that space courageously for all of us. 

‘You used to say, “I will do what I can and I will say what I should. These intolerant voices find strength in our silence.” You did just that. There was no silencing you then and even now.  

‘Like Anais Nin said, “One’s highest mission in life can only be to try and be at peace with one’s self.” Can’t be truer than of you! The complete sincerity with which for decades you fought the forces of gendered, caste and communal discrimination, much like Basavanna the founder of the faith you were born into. Like you said when fighting even those forces within the community who were failing him, “Basavanna not only protested these (Vedic texts, caste and gender discrimination), he offered an alternative that is an anti-thesis of sanatana dharma.” The conviction with which you spoke truth to power and damn the consequences! 

‘The camaraderie that your forged – across different movements, be it that of the Adivasis, Aambedkarities or Transgender, Queer Assertions; within the progressive circles that you felt was getting fragmented; with younger activists, students hounded by the right-wing regime and who you joyously embraced as your children. Your unflinching solidarity with persecuted Muslims and minorities of all hues. The pain and passion with which you stood for Rohith Vemula, another star! The courage with which you made the transition from English to Kannada media, taking on the powerful legacy of a legend like your father and becoming a legend yourself! We loved the Lankesh Patrike. 

‘We loved the Gauri Lankesh Patrike and we loved the relentless and thousand ways in which you spoke out for a just, fair and compassionate society. 

‘Salute Gauri to the organic, authentic and genuine intellectual and activist that you were.

‘In commemorating your death and in condemning the release on bail of the eight accused, a move meant to embolden criminals of the worst kind, we reiterate the need to recast ‘the murder of Gauri Lankesh’ as a hate crime against humanity. We reiterate our resolve to defend Democracy, Pluralism, Egalitarianism. We reiterate our resolve to defend Free Speech and Reason. We reiterate the need for questioning the state’s complicity and the judiciary’s failure in upholding our basic civil liberties and democratic rights as citizens. But more than anything else, we reiterate our collective determination to not be silenced.

‘Like Angela Davis said, “One has to act as if it were possible to radically transform the world and one has to do it all the time.” You did and we shall too, for it was always a collective battle and always will be. And in this battle, we wish for ourselves not only your courage and political commitment, but also your lightness of being and your radical humanity that radiated through all those relationships big and small that you forged in and beyond your time, ensuring that you will never go away.  

‘As the inimitable Basavanna said, “things standing shall fall, but the moving ever shall stay”. You move through the millions fighting for justice. You live on. In our hearts, In our hopes. Long Live Gauri! The Fire and Flower!’ 

In profound solidarity, salutes and deep love,

All India Feminist Alliance (ALIFA – NAPM)

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Five years since we lost Gauri Lankesh

The post Murder of Gauri Lankesh a hate crime against humanity, condemn release on bail of 8 accused: ALIFA Open letter appeared first on SabrangIndia.

To reimagine India in Authoritarian times is to first and foremost truthfully bear witness to what is happening around us, to acknowledge the rifts being created, to name the injustices and cruelty and to call out the powers that divide.

We are here today to honour the memory of Gauri Lankesh who so bravely spoke truth to power and who even in death reminds us to bear truthful witness however painful that may be, and I am grateful and would like to say a thank you for being given this opportunity to be part of today’s very special and important gathering.

As I stand here in India, as we in the Northeast are fond of calling the country that lies beyond the chicken neck, I want to begin with a few introductions and disclaimers.

My name is Angela Rangad, I belong to the Matrilineal Khasi tribe of Meghalaya. I am also a beef eating, pork savouring Christian who also dips into the indigenous Khasi faith system for sustenance. I do not like to wear my religious and ethnic affiliations on my sleeve, but in today’s India, I feel it imperative to display my multi-layered identity of being a Christian and, a scheduled tribe minority woman, as a way of challenging those who wish us away.

When India got its independence in 1947, the self-governing, Khasi states that make up the major part of today’s Meghalaya, were unsure of joining the larger nation-state called India. And that was OK. There were attempts then, even at such a crucial juncture, of leaders both

Indian and Khasi considering this hesitation of the Khasi States and its people as something legitimate – to be acknowledged, debated and taken seriously.

Today, when representatives from our region are being silenced in the parliament, it is hard to imagine that Rev. JJM Nichols Roy confronted the majoritarian minded leaders of the

Constituent Assembly who openly wanted to assimilate the Tribals of India into their notion of a dominant Indian culture and society. He said

“It is said by one honourable gentleman that the hill tribes have to be brought to the culture which he said “Our culture” meaning the culture of the plains men. But what is culture? Does it mean dress or eating and drinking: if it means eating and drinking or ways of living, the hill tribes can claim that they have a better system than some of the people of the plains? I think the latter must rise up to their standard. Among the tribesmen there is no difference between class and class. Is that practised in the plains?”

Actively supported in the Constituent Assembly by visionary leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru and Dr. Ambedkar, our leaders like Rev. J.J.M. Nichols Roy, Jaipal Singh Munda and others spoke fearlessly of the visions and aspirations of the small tribes and fought to ensure constitutional provisions of autonomy that became enshrined in the 5th and 6th schedule of the constitution.

The democracy that India envisaged for itself at its founding moment was not going to be just a brutality of numbers, but an everyday aspiration of many sovereignties and freedoms. I grew up listening to the stories about people from our hill, such as Mavis Dunn – one of the first women cabinet ministers in India who articulated both the desire for Khasi freedom and freedom of khasi women in front of the Bardoloi Committee. Stories of Wilson Reade, who gate crashed a meeting of Prime Minister Nehru, demanding provincial autonomy from Assam for the hill tribes. They did this without fear of reprisal or arrest. All of it seems like a dream now. Every day a new ideological horror is being perpetrated against all of us.

Seven decades on, that promise of the Constitution of India of ensuring open dialogues, of tentative relationships being OK, of the possibility of questioning being the edifice upon which our multi-cultural multi ethnic communities will determine their collective lives, is being undermined. Or in the words of Late L. G. Shullai, it is as if we have exchanged British India for Bharat India or the Hindu Rashtra being peddled today.

Today, we no longer refer to those who ought to be representing us as OUR govt. More and more we refer to those in power as The Regime. And this is telling. Regime – a word that conjures in our minds the feeling of being controlled, of having little choices and of being regimented into ONE uniform India.

For us from North East India, uniformity is an impossibility. And that is not only OK, but it has allowed us to thrive. With over 200 tribes having 300 plus languages and dialects between us, we contend with diverse cultural practices, customs and religions. A constellation of indigenous faiths and beliefs, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, heterodox Hinduism find expression across the region.

We are also a region that has, before maps got set and drawn, lived our relationships beyond the hills and rivers that defines India’s territoriality – which is why today when the military coup in Myanmar forced people to flee, the communities in states like Mizoram ensured refuge to them. Mizoram as a state, understanding the sentiment of a shared history and community relations extended a helping hand.

It is here that we find ourselves at odds with the regressive push of papering over these myriad and minute elements that define us. There can never be One Nation, One Law, One Belief to encapsulate our multi layered identities, relationships and ways of being.

Federalism as a key principle therefore, should not be emphasised merely as the sharing of powers between the union and the states but as an acknowledgement of the diversity within states and regions.

An acceptance that this experience of plural identities and relationships is best understood by those living it. If these local experiences and knowledge is what is allowed to inform policy and governance, the union of states as envisaged by the framers of our constitution would indeed become a reality.

The very idea of India where smaller communities like ours could have a political, economic and cultural voice seem distant now, under this regime. Although to be truthful, the relationship between India and its Northeast, very soon after independence, was sought to be turned into one of a patron-client relationship overseen by the security state, that process has now been further weaponised in favour of Delhi, and the Federal imagination is now being replaced by notions of double engine governments. For small states in the North East it is a reality that even when combined together we do not command legislative clout in terms of the number of representatives- and the number is set to further diminish if the proposed plans of delimitation go through. It is also a fact that for many North eastern states, our economies are crippled.

This dependency on the union has been used as a tool to put us in our place. An arm twisting that has pitted one neighbouring state against another and most crucially pushing communities and tribes to be wary and suspicious of each other. Double engine government has meant a replication of the divisive politics and hate that is on exhibition at the centre.

What is happening in Manipur today, is precisely this. A double engine government that is twice complicating the already complex histories and tenuous relationships among the people in this state. The Double Engine government has doubled the oppression, doubled the violence, and doubled the mistrust. The failure to contain the violence and hostilities for more than four months  now, clearly shows not only the total complicity of the double engine government but a glaring undermining, by design, of the federal guarantees of our constitution.

Manipur has also shown us how a regime can use communities – their sense of specialness and deprivation and the notions of majority to form blocks and cartels that can so easily be deployed for the larger sinister geo-political narratives and visions of an Akhand Bharat. I do not claim to be speaking on behalf of the people of Manipur, but after our recent visits there, many of us feel Manipur is a major experimentation in the region. A project to have a nation of majoritarian hate-filled cartels that will pave the way for easy access and exploitation of whatever resources the region may have by pitting communities against each other rather than allowing them their constant everyday messy negotiations, give and take and contradictions.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not here to glorify the region nor to romanticise its cultures, customs and practices. It has never been all love and fair play. There are fights. Claims and counterclaims. We have our fair share of looters, oppressors and patriarchs. However, if we are to reclaim our voices and spaces, we have to turn to our strength. That being our communities. The diversity and the entanglements which this diversity brings is what more than ever we will have to recognise, reclaim, embrace and work with. We cannot allow our communities to be used for a project that seeks to annihilate us. We as tribals cannot keep quiet when Dalits are targeted. We, as, Christians cannot allow our faith to be used to bring international legitimacy to a regime that persecutes our Muslim brothers and sisters. The Union of Communities needs to come together in solidarity of the MANY against ONE.

And, may I take this opportunity to also call out the so-called leaders in our north-eastern states who have played a politics of convenience for power and allowed themselves to be subsumed under majoritarian politicking. They have sold us out and sacrificed indigeneity, and even Christ at the altar of greed. It is a myth that Meghalaya or Nagaland or Mizoram is being led by regional parties. What we have is BJP-lite. Even as we rejected the BJP in the elections, we have BJP directed governments. The Prime Minister merely throws us representational crumbs in images of him with cultural symbols like headgear and tribal fabric wrapped around his neck or badly mouthing local language greetings from an auto-cue, while his government passes laws like the Forest Conservation Amendment Act that blatantly takes away our land and forests from our control.

We, as citizens, seem to be losing control over everything that makes a country ours. And At a time in our history when our institutions have been hollowed out, legislative processes hijacked and our ideals of liberty, equality and secularism are being held to ransom I hold on to some of my Khasi ideals as my personal existential weapon. For a khasi there are two important principles that are supposed to guide one’s life. Tip Briew – Tip Blei and Kamai Ia Ka Hok. Tip Briew – Tip Blei literally translates into” knowing humanity is knowing god”.

When the lens of humanity is being systematically blurred out and broken and when the decade long assertion of majoritarianism with its culture of impunity and hate filled mobs tearing us apart – we have to piece it back together with the Khasi principle of Tip Briew – Tip Blei. Knowing and embracing humanity forces us to be reflexive and there can be no Vishwa Guru greater that a self that is directed by an understanding, acceptance and compassion for another.

Kamai Ia ka Hok means to earn Righteousness. To live a life not of greed but of communitarian sufficiency. Today, when it has become difficult to distinguish Govt. from big capital and when corruption has been Adani – ised and development no longer remains a consultative process but a diktat, emphasising on the other khasi principle and praxis of Kamai la ka Hok becomes even more relevant.

So, may I end by imploring all of us present today to Tip Briew – Tip Blei, to Kamai Ia ka Hok and to constantly remind ourselves that the India of today is not our destiny. Together, we must continue to rage against the imprisonment we all feel. We need to constantly ask – Do we want to second guess ourselves all the time? To look over our shoulder and worry about the names we have? Can’t we enjoy a train ride the way we used to? Can’t we sit at a table and share our cuisines and joke about the smelly foods that some of us consume? Can’t we draw strength?

From each other – from the farmers and what they achieved at the borders of Delhi? Can’t we look south – to the peoples of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and imbibe their sense of self to stand up against bullies, Can’t we borrow courage from Kashmiris imagining a world beyond the prison bars and from a subjugated northeast that continues to draw breath?

Can’t we have a life like a river – we meander, we change course, we ebb and flow, we nurture, we even sometimes destroy but we move forward always with the promise of the expanse of an ocean awaiting…

The author, a political activist from Meghalaya wrote this for a memorial held at Town Hall, Bengaluru, September 5, 2023, 5-8 p.m.

Related:

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Remembering Gauri Lankesh, Renewing A Pledge

Five years since we lost Gauri Lankesh

The post TO BE LIKE RIVERS- Reimagining India in Authoritarian Times, a soul cry from India’s North East appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Gauri was found by friends and then family lying in a pool of blood. This brutal killing had shaken the  conscience of the people and led to support for condolence meets and protests across the length and breadth of India. . It is now almost certain that right-wing extremists targeted Gauri – an icon  whose every word, every sentence she wrote, was targeted at the growing communalism, injustice, and equality in the country.

Gauri’s was the last in the long line of four such similar assassinations of rationalists, Narendra Dabholkar (August 20, 2013), Govind O Pansare (February 2015) and MM Kalburgi (August 28, 2015).

Each of these were and are in their own way known for bold and humanely rational stands against growing authoritarianism.

Gauri Memorial dialogue

Each year, even as the gruesome assassination of Gauri Lankesh appears to be fading away from public memory, the morning’s graveyard tributes at her samadhi (Lingayat Rudrabhumi at Chamarpet) is a sombre reminder of all that has been lost and all that lives on. Apart from family and friends, over 100  activists and representatives of movements gathered this morning from 7.30 a.m. onwards in joy-filled sorrowful tribute.

Each year, January 29 (2018 onwards) or September 5, the day Gauri was slain, the Gauri Memorial Trust (formed after her killing) organises dialogues, marches, protests and events that symbolise what Gauri Kankesh fought, lived and died for.

This year, the Gauri Memorial Trust has organised a dialogue on “Remembering India In Authoritarian Times” on her death anniversary to mark the 6th year of Gauri’s assassination at Town Hall in Bengaluru.

Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah, a friend of Gauri Lankesh, farmers’ leader Rakesh Tikait, Angela G Rangad – political activist, Meghalaya, noted actor and political activist Prakash Raj, political leader KK Shylaja, former journalist Supriya Shinate and Muslim leader Vasin Malpe are expected to participate in the discussions. Farmer’s leader Tikait, accompanied by colleagues from Rajasthan and Punjab also paid tributes this morning at the Rudrabhumi.

Apex court’s observation

Six years after the crime, the trial  into Gauri’s assassination case seems to be progressing at a snail’s pace. The court is once a week, dedicated to this case. The recent Supreme Court’s order on August 19, asking the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to look into a larger conspiracy in the killings of Dabholkar, Pansare, MM Kalburgi and Gauri Lankesh, has brought the chilling assassination of Gauri and Kalburgi to the fore again.

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Demand for special court

Kavitha Lankesh, sister of Gauri Lanlkesh and other members of the Gauri Memorial Trust, are also concerned at the pace of the trial. Presently, of the 19 accused, 18 are already behind bars, after the filing of the chargesheet. Of the 400 plus eyewitnesses in the court, examination of over 80has been completed, he added.

Today there are discussions among Gauri’s friends and family members who are considering urging the government to constitute a Special Court to hear Gauri’s case. The demand has not been met so far. With the Congress government returning to power in Karnataka, it is to be seen whether chief minister Siddaramaiah, in whose earlier term Gauri was assassinated, will take the initiative in constituting a special court.”

Documentaries on Gauri

Pradeep KP, a Bengaluru-based media activist, also known as Pradeep Deepu of Pedestrian Pictures, made a 67-minute documentary, ‘Our Gauri’, in September 2017. Deepu extensively used various footage he collected over 16 years and completed his film ‘Our Gauri’ in just 20 days. This documentary has been shown in more than 600 screens across the country.

Kavitha Lankesh, a woman filmmaker, who has made a name for herself in Indian cinema, has made another documentary on her sister Gauri, which is different from Deepu’s documentary in terms of treatment. Initially, Kavitha wanted to make a full-length feature film on Gauri, (In fact, she still wants to do that). However, after a call by Free Press Unlimited, Kavitha made a documentary simply titled ‘Gauri’.

Awards galore for ‘Gauri’

This documentary won the Best Human Rights Film award at the Toronto Women’s Film Festival (TWIFF) in 2022. ‘Gauri’ won the Best Long Documentary Award at the South Asian Film Festival of Montreal. Juries observed that the film is , “a brave and uncompromising pulse-taking of current crisis in Indian politics, focusing on the 2017 political assassination of trailblazing Bengaluru journalist Gauri Lankesh”. ‘Gauri’ has screened at the International Documentary Film Festival of Amsterdam, Sundance Film Festival and other film festivals across the globe.

Sister’s  documentary

Kavitha scripted and shot the film for Free Press Unlimited, while fighting to get justice for her sister Gauri, tapping the doors of state machinery and judiciary.

‘Gauri’ has a larger canvas than the earlier documentary which had been made in the heat of the moment, and is more intense. It speaks about the radical, ideological and political positions of Gauri. Kavitha shot the documentary in various parts of the country where Gauri worked in her career as a journalist and left her footprints.

Besides delineating the radical, ideological and political positions of Gauri, the film narrates Gauri’s struggle for freedom of expression by upholding the rights of the oppressed classes, besides fighting strong divisive forces in the country. It also speaks intensely about certain issues, which may trigger a backlash from Hindutva fundamentalist forces.

Three important highlights of Gauri’s activism, such as her fight against the communalisation of Bababudangiri Sufi shrine; and her protests to oppose the displacement of tribals in the Diddalli area of Kodagu region and Kudremukh National Park are vividly visualised in this documentary. The film also traces the network of Hindu fundamentalists responsible for the elimination of Gauri, from Belagavi to Goa and Maharashtra.

It is Esha Lankesh’s (daughter of Kavitha) words before the documentary ends that make the audience emotional. When the documentary was screened for a selected audience last year, tears filled the eyes of those who watched the film, when they exited from the theatre. The documentary connects emotionally to everyone who knows even a bit about Gauri.

Formation of SIT (2017-2018)

Meanwhile, the Congress government, headed by Siddaramaiah, had asked the Karnataka DGP and IGP to constitute a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the killing of Gauri. The SIT probe was headed by an Inspector General officer. Siddaramaiah had also declared then that the government had an “open mind” for a CBI investigation, a demand made by Gauri’s family.

The presence of CCTV camera footage for a mere four seconds was the only clue the SIT had for the first three months after its investigation into the case. Instead of waiting for some substantial clue, SIT launched a massive surveillance exercise to find something as concrete evidence.

Trailing the accused

On September 13, 2017,  the Karnataka Forensic Science Laboratory’s ballistic report concluded that Gauri Lankesh was killed with the same gun used to kill scholar M M Kalburgi in Dharwad in 2015. Based on that finding, the SIT started studying the activities of radical right-wing activists by the end of September. This was because the CBI probe in the Dabholkar case and the Maharashtra SIT probe in the Pansare case had suggested the involvement of activists linked to the radical outfit, Sanatan Sanstha and its affiliate Hindu Jagarana Samithi (HJS) in the two murders in Maharashtra.

In January 2018, the SIT intercepted telephone conversations of Hindu Yuva Sena and HJS-linked activist K T Naveen Kumar with reference to involvement in Gauri’s murder and planned to carry out another murder. Naveen Kumar was arrested for the possession of illegal arms in February 2018 and in connection with Gauri’s murder case. In May 2018, the SIT tracked down Sujith Kumar, a former HJS activist on whose instruction Naveen Kumar was trying to get a gun. According to reports, Sujith Kumar and others were planning to carry out the murder of another rationalist K S Bhagavan.

Arrest after arrest

Based on information obtained from Sujith Kumar, SIT arrested three men – Amol Kale, Amit Degwekar and Manohar Yadave from Vijayapura in May 2018. All three were arrested after finding rough maps of Gauri’s home and details of weapons and a recce in their dairies.

Subsequently, on June 12, 2018 Parashuram Waghmare, a Sri Rama Sena activist, was arrested and identified as Gauri’s shooter on the basis of Kale’s diary. Likewise, in July 2018, Ganesh Miskin, the alleged bike rider who had transported the shooter to Gauri’s home was arrested along with Rajesh Bangera, an alleged arms trainer.

In August, Suresh HL, a former HJS man who allegedly sheltered the killers and stored the guns after the murder, was arrested. Similarly, Bharat Kane, Sharad Kalaksar and Sudhanva Gondhalekar, Shrikanth Pangarkar, Vasudeva Suryavamshi were arrested in connection with the case in the next three months.

The SIT filed its first chargesheet naming alleged gun runner and Hindutva activist T Naveen Kumar as an accused. The 650-page chargesheet was filed before the First Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate on May 30, 2018. SIT filed a 10,000-page additional chargesheet in the Gauri murder case against 18 persons on November 23, 2018.

Related:

Gauri, a film on journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh wins international award: Montreal 2023

Gauri Lankesh Assassination: Accused denied bail by Aurangabad HC

Remembering Gauri Lankesh, Renewing A Pledge

Five years since we lost Gauri Lankesh

The post Gauri Lankesh assassination: 6 years down, no closure for family and friends, justice elusive appeared first on SabrangIndia.

At  the vibrant function in Bengaluru on Friday, May 26, an Open Letter to the newly elected government was given. Senior activists were present including those who had worked hard to make the Eddelu Karnataka movement a reality, built alliances, and worked on the ground.

The contents of the May 26 is below:

People’s expectations and steps that Congress must take to fulfil them

The Congress party has to take three main steps to respond to public expectations:

1. Fulfil its promises: The five guarantees given by the Congress – increased rations, 200 units of free electricity, Rs 2000 per month for women of the household, free travel for women and Rs 3000 per month for the unemployed – must be implemented without fail.

Whether right or wrong, you must honour the word you have given to the people. We believe these are only emergency measures to alleviate suffering, not permanent solutions. The real solution to the problems of the society today is to raise people’s incomes, ensure employment, reduce costs and create an environment of mutual cooperation and fraternity. Although the government should work in that direction in the long run, today it should first fulfil its promises.

2. Mend the damage done by the BJP’s misrule:

The BJP’s rule has brought two kinds of damage:

• Anti-people laws to further corporate interests and hate politics have been ushered, such as the Land Reforms Amendment Act, APMC Act, Cattle Act, National Education Policy, Anti-conversion Act, Electricity Privatization Act, casteism in the revision of textbooks, cancellation of reservation for minorities, betrayal under the guise of reservation etc. Cases were filed against those who fought against these evil policies, taking away the possibility of protest.
• Shocking increase in prices, 40% corruption and rampant politicization have made the life of the common man unbearable.

The second main task before the Congress government is to repeal all these anti-people measures and acts and formulate pro-people acts. The socio-economic situation of each community should be transparently put forth through a caste census, and a comprehensive solution evolved by taking the public into confidence. All cases filed against activists by the previous government should be withdrawn and the people’s right to protest restored. Plans should be made to curb corruption and price rise, and re-establish a spirit of peace and fraternity.

3. Government should be responsive to people’s demands: Those who govern should first listen to people’s demands, before deciding the government’s course of action. The government should reach out and listen to various groups who have put forward different demands and struggled for them, and collectively work out a solution. People’s demands are reasonable – for farmers, a fair price for their crops and rights over bagair hokum lands; housing for the homeless, strengthening of MGNREGA and its expansion to cities, an increase in minimum wages, equal pay for equal work, job security, social justice, fair reservations with internal reservation, extortion-free education, accessible healthcare, nutritious food, old pension scheme, security for the destitute, protection and proper status for women, abolition of evil practices and freedom from debt. In short, what people are asking for is a dignified, peaceful life. How can a government not respond to this? It is easy to come up with a long list of what the government should do. We are not doing it, instead, we have a simple request. First, get each department to reach out and start a dialogue with the people and those who are fighting for the people. Consult the social organizations, take comprehensive decisions and begin work at once. Create a democratic system where the government is subject to public scrutiny so that all can see whether you are working as you have promised.

If the government responds to the people, the people will respond to the government. You will see even better results in 2024. Otherwise, power is never permanent. There is no other alternative to avoid the danger of the same evil forces seizing power again. Hence the Congress must pay attention to the above three aspects.

We will continue our duty as the voice of civil society, and work as a real and constructive opposition party. We will cooperate with the government’s good work, and at the same time oppose its negligence. We trust you will honour and respect this relationship.

We end with one last word from concerned citizens – “Let the government act as it speaks, and let its actions be its words”.

On behalf of all the common people of Karnataka, “Eddelu Karnataka”….

Rest of the Letter

May 6, 2023

An open letter

To the Chief Minister, Deputy Chief Minister, and all Ministers and MLAs of the Congress Party:

At long last, Karnataka has heaved a big sigh of relief. The people of the state have rejected the government which has given them unprecedented bad governance. They have given your party a clear majority. We offer our best wishes to you and all your party workers for this victory. We all hope your government will serve its full five years with stability and unity. On this occasion, we would like to bring some issues to your attention.

First of all, we hope you will agree that this victory is not only the victory of the Congress party but also the victory of the masses. The anger within the people of the state has expressed itself as contempt for the BJP. It was not only the people who were determined to defeat this misrule – many pro-people organizations, grassroots organizations, literary thinkers and media friends worked tirelessly to mobilize the people’s minds towards it. Organizations of Dalits, minorities, backward communities, farmers, agricultural workers, labour, women, sexual minorities and transgender communities, and many democratic organizations worked relentlessly. Special recognition is due to individuals and organizations from the Lingayath, Vaishya and Brahmin communities who worked to defeat the BJP. Amongst these various efforts, of special note is ‘Eddelu Karnataka’, which emerged as a collective action of many organizations and eminent people. It can be said with confidence that ‘Eddelu Karnataka’ has created a new type of program and worked hard to influence the vote. It has taken on the duty both of shaping the public opinion and organizing the secular voters.

Our social media teams strived to convey the issues of price hike, corruption and hate politics that have devastated the people’s lives. With more than 1000 posters in different languages, 80 videos and 8 effective song albums, they have touched people’s hearts. Apart from committed print media,s a new generation of digital media houses emerging as an alternative 1 to Godi Media has exposed BJP’s mismanagement on a large scale and foiled their plots through more than 500 stories. The effective countering of the BJP’s Urigowda – Nanje Gowda campaign is an example of this.

Eddelu Karnataka was also active on the ground, selecting 103 constituencies where BJP is strong and forming over 150 teams to take the message of “Why BJP must be defeated” to the doorsteps of the people. More than 10 lakh copies of literature were printed for this effective campaign across the state. People have memorized the three basic principles of defeating the BJP – “Voting should be increased”, “Votes should not be divided”, and “Vote only for those who can defeat the BJP”. These three formulas, especially the third one, had a great effect on the results. On the basis of this stand, efforts to defeat the BJP have been made in essence by rallying support to Congress in most constituencies, but also JDS and other candidates in a few even as the need to struggle with them eventually was also stressed.

In sum, Eddelu Karnataka has not limited itself to ideological campaigning, but has effectively reached out to the grassroots and influenced voting behavior to a good extent. The pent-up anger of the people, the hope created by the Congress party guarantees and the active role played by social forces including Eddelu Karnataka all came together to ensure victory.

This campaign has brought immense experience to civil society. It has built the confidence that people can be organized on an even larger scale by 2024. In this context, what needs to be clarified is that ‘Eddelu Karnataka’ was an independent civil society campaign. Those in it do not belong to any party and have not received any financial assistance from any party. The driving force behind the entire campaign is the urge to remove the anti-constitutional, dictatorial, socially harmful BJP from power.

Together, we have pushed back the misrule of this BJP government. But the real challenge starts here. People are fed up with BJP and have chosen Congress with great hope and expectations, despite some doubt whether the Congress would fulfil its promises. Congress now should decide whether it will meet the expectations of the people, or disappoint them. This time we said clearly, “Defeat the BJP which has brought misrule”. For us to approach the people with the same spirit in 2024, the Congress has to meet the expectations of the people. In the words of Devanura Mahadeva. “Enough of words, now works must speak”, ” 2024 will be won with deeds, not just with words”. “We must be inspired next to call for Eddelu India”. We hope that his words come true.

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The post Eddelu Karnataka Urges Siddaramaiah Govt to Repeal Unjust Laws, Combat Hate Politics, Address Inflation/Unemployment appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The citation of the award reads “A brave and uncompromising pulse-taking of the current crisis in Indian politics, focusing on the 2017 political assassination of trailblazing Bengaluru journalist Gauri Lankesh. A “J’accuse” docu-thriller directed and narrated with verve by Gauri’s sister, Kavitha Lankesh”.

Another documentary, an Indian entry, “All That Breathes”,  which was an Oscar nominee was also in competition and won the runner up. The documentary film “Gauri” has been commissioned by Free Press Unlimited, Amsterdam. Free press Unlimited mission stems from Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights : Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas  through any media and regardless of frontiers.

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The post Gauri, a film on journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh wins international award: Montreal 2023 appeared first on SabrangIndia.