Image Courtesy: Neville Harson

No rain, Junaid will fill
this empty cup of grief thirst,
even though this is more June rain
than we want, 
and elsewhere, boys like you,
with other names,
live and float paper boats,
and scavenge for fish
is unlikely, sudden street-pools, 
food on their mind all the time.

The post No Rain, Junaid: A Poem by K Srilata appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The brazen and brutal violence unleashed on our sons has rid us of any fear, dared Shahira and Fatima Nafees mothers of two sons, one dead and the other missing, both victims of the hate-letting unleashed under the current regime. Speaking at a meeting at Haj House in Mumbai on Saturday, both women dared the prime minister with his claim of a 56-inch chest! Why does he not have the moral courage to look us in the eye, meet our demands. ensure that the guilty are brought to book, they demanded?

Nafees’ son , 27 year old Najeeb has been missing since October 2016 after an alleged assault by members of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) at the Jawaharlal Nehru University(JNU) in Delhi. JNU is a university under attack for its radical and liberal values by the Modi regime since Feburary 2016. The ABVP is a wing of the far right Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the ideological fountainhead of the NDA II regime. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) finally closed the case in October 2018. Nafees is planning to challenge the closure in a protest petition soon. It is believed that top level functionaries of the Modi have been protecting the nine accused in the case. These nine have not ven been questioned by the CBI. The CBI itself is under a cloud after brazen interference in its functioning by the prime minister’s office (PMO).

“I dare the primine minister to meet us, look me in the eye and say no wrong was done to my son. This regime that is fuelled on hate and violence will not come back to power. The 56 inch chest will deflate,” Fatima said. Hailing from Badaun in Uttar Pradesh, Fatima spoke of the hardships involved in the struggle for justice, the delays, the callous attitudes of the law enforcement agencies amd even the courts.

Junaid, a 16 year old from Faridabad was literally beaten or lynched to death in June 2017 when on a Delhi Mathura train returning home with his two brothers after Eid shopping. While Junaid tragically died his brothers were seriously injured in the assault that was clearly communal, with vile abuse being flung at the boys and their beards being pulled. Junaid’s tragic death had resulted in a nationwide outrage of anger and protest. Sabrangindia had been the most prompt to report on this tragic death after the CPIM in a rare and prompt move had moved on the issue.   The #NotInMyName Protests after Junaid’s killing had showed some resistance to the repeated violence against minorities that has been a hallmark of this regime.

The dimunitive Shahira, mother of Junaid who also spoke in Mumbai yesterday was scathing of the state of affairs related to the case in her son’s mother. ” The FIR itself has not included the crucial sections of section 302 and 307 (murder and attempt to murder), she said. Six of the accused have been let off by the courts on bail. There is talk of the main accused standing for the coming elections. We need to speak out. There should be no question of feeling afraid. My son’s death has killed the fear in me,” she said.

A Noida based businessman, Amit Jani has floated an outfit called the Uttar Pradesh Navnirmal Sena and has announced that Naresh Kumar, the main accused in the killing of Junaid will contest the elections. He has also reportedly stated that all those accused of killing Muslims should fight the elections.

Both Shahira and Fatima stressed the need of educating Muslim, Dalit and Bahujan youth so that young persons make it to top positions and ensure both representation and justice for the marginalised. “I was not educated and my husband is a carpenter. But apart from Najeeb my other sons too are post graduates and my daughter, too is studying,” she said.

Fahad Ahmad from TISS also spoke on the occasion. Teesta Setalvad, co editor of Sabrangindia and secretary, Citizens for Justice and Peace, spoke of the emergent opposition to this repressive regime. ” It is the youth like Rohith Vemula, Umar Khalid, Kanhaiya Kumat and survivors like Shahira and Fatima Nafees who have emerged as the strong voice of resistance and opposition to this regime,” she said.

Related Articles:

1. How India Unleashes Violence Against Mothers The unending struggles of Fatima Nafees and Radhika Vemula

The post Modi Regime has Rid us of Fear: Mothers Shahira & Fatima Nafees dare Govt appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Shahane, known for her liberal views, said that she did not care what religion did the 16-year-old Junaid belong to nor was she bothered about the religious background of the Harayana boy’s murderers.

She wrote, “I don’t care what religion those lynchers belonged to. Nor do I care what religion Junaid belonged to. I only care about one thing. A group of mean, cruel human beings killed a teenager and assaulted three other young men brutally!”

Sharing her personal fear, Shahane said that her heart ‘breaks for Junaid’s mother because her own elder son will turn 16 next year.

“My elder son will turn 16 next year. My heart breaks for Junaid’s mother. Not only did a group of cruel human beings kill Junaid, another group of cruel human beings egged them on. Junaid was also killed by those cruel people who witnessed the insanity & chose to remain silent,” Her Facebook post said.

Read her full Facebook post below;

NOT IN MY NAME

Junaid was lynched by a mob of cruel human beings. I don’t care what religion those lynchers belonged to. Nor do I care what religion Junaid belonged to. I only care about one thing. A group of mean, cruel human beings killed a teenager and assaulted three other young men brutally!
Junaid was 16.
My elder son will turn 16 next year.
My heart breaks for Junaid’s mother.
Not only did a group of cruel human beings kill Junaid, another group of cruel human beings egged them on. Junaid was also killed by those cruel people who witnessed the insanity & chose to remain silent.
There are some cruel people who justify this lynching.
Yes! Hate allows for all sorts of justification.
There has been a long list of these lynchings. It has become so common that no one talks about it. Nobody asks questions about what happened to the perpetrators. Whether they were caught & given the strictest punishment or whether they were released to unleash more violence!
I cannot fathom how anyone can kill unarmed, innocent human beings!
I cannot fathom how people can justify this horrific violence!
Instead of taking law into their own hands why are police complaints not made?
Is it because the lynch mob knows that there is no reason behind what they have done?
All they want to do is to kill in the name of hate.
Whichever religion, ideology, language, ethnicity you belong to, lynching done in any name cannot be condoned!
We’ve suffered so many riots, terrorist attacks, pogroms, lynchings but we haven’t learnt anything.
The bottom line is that innocent human beings become the target of that hate. They are usually poor. They are usually those who are incapable of fighting back. It is really too, too disheartening.
Innocence dies when hate rules!
I cannot be a part of those who encourage hate.
I was with the Ekta Manch marching from Parel to Azad Maidan singing ” Hum hongey kaamyaab….” to promote brotherhood between fellow citizens of all faiths in 1993 after the horrendous riots followed by the heinous bomb blasts in Mumbai.
I marched to the Gateway of India to protest the utter failure & crass mishandling of 26/11 by the then Congress Govt in the State and the Centre in 2008.
I supported the Anna Hazare anti corruption movement when he waged the civil battle against the UPA 2 Govt at the Centre.
I was vocal about women’s safety after the horrendous rape & murder of Jyoti Singh as well as Pallavi Purkayastha as well as the sickening hacking of Swathi.
Today I stand firmly against the lynch mentality that has an active political patronage in our country.
I do not belong to any political party. I am a citizen of one of the finest democracies in the World. That is why it is so important for all of us to respect & protect the tenets of our Constitution.
I, as a proud citizen of India, do not conform to the views of anyone who actively or passively supports this lynching.
My allegiance lies with the Constitution of India.
If the Govt or any other body does anything to undermine the basic tenets of democracy in our country, I will vocally oppose it.
I so wanted to be a part of the peaceful civil protest at Carter Road today but I can’t. But I will not be a part of this hate!
I do not want my children to inherit this hate.
I will not have the blood of innocents on my hands.

NOT IN MY NAME!

Courtesy: Facebook Post
 

The post #NotInMyName: Renuka Shahane’s gut-wrenching post will make you cry appeared first on SabrangIndia.

On 22 June 2017 fifteen-year old Hafiz Junaid was stabbed to death on a Mathura-bound train from New Delhi. He was traveling home for Eid with his brothers and two friends. A dispute over seats resulted in a group of men repeatedly assaulting and stabbing Junaid and his companions. The assailants flung their bodies onto the Asoti railway platform. A crowd gathered. At some point an ambulance was called and two bodies were taken away. Junaid is dead. His companions are in critical condition. While one person has been arrested the police investigations are running into a wall of social opacity since they have been unable to find a single eye-witness to the incident. Of the 200 hundred strong crowd that assembled on Asoti railway platform on Thursday evening, the police cannot find one person who can say what they saw. The police cannot find a witness because something very peculiar seems to have happened to those present at Junaid’s death. A report by Kaunain Sherrif M in the Indian Express provides specific details. When asked if he had seen anything that evening, Ram Sharan a corn-vendor whose daily shift coincides with the killing, Sharan said he was not present at the time of the incident. Two staffers who were sent to investigate by the station master were unavailable for comment. Neither the station-master, the post-master or the railway guards saw the event they were present at.

In this startling piece the journalist reports how the public lynching of a Muslim child becomes a social non-event in contemporary India. He shows the reconfiguring, and splitting, of a social field of vision. He reports all the ways in which people – Hindus- did not see the body of a dead – Muslim – child that lay in front of them. The Hindus on the Asoti railway platform managed to collectively not see a 15 year old Muslim boy being stabbed to death. Then they collectively, and without prior agreement, continued to not see what they had seen after the event. This is the uniquely terrifying aspect of this incident on which this report reflects: the totalising force of an unspoken, but collectively binding, agreement between Hindus to not see the dead body of a Muslim child. Hindus on this railway platform in a small station in north India instantly produced a stranger sociality, a common social bond between people who do not otherwise know each other. By mutual recognition between strangers, Hindus at this platform agreed to abide by a code of silence by which the death of a Muslim child can not be seen by 200 people in full public view on a railway platform in today’s India.

If this has happened we are far beyond the Gujarat pogroms, perhaps because the logics unleashed at that time have reached their final denouement. In 2002 we saw the clasped hands of a Muslim man pleading for his life from armed Hindu mobs. In 2017 there is nothing to see and no one to see it. One way to read this public blindness is as the breakdown of a social contract in purely descriptive terms- that of recognizing the body before you as being one to whom fundamental social obligations (such as the protection undertaken by adults towards children) are owed as a result of membership within the social body. The Hindus on this railway platform did not believe that any fundamental obligations, indeed even the most basic as an acknowledgment of his (dead)existence, were owed to Junaid. I stress this one social relation -that between adults and children -because its public disregard usually occurs in those situations (such as warfare, pogroms, genocides, lynchings) when social bonds have come asunder. When some adults refuse to see some dead bodies as dead children (the Holocaust, slavery) it means that the persons these children would have grown up to be are not deemed worthy of living on into membership in the socio-political order. The affective alienation by which a gathered crowd of Hindus can lynch, break, stab, tear into pieces a Muslim boy, and then not see what is left, is because these Hindus do not think Muslims belong in the social body.

Yet this analysis goes only so far because something much more terrifying seems to have occurred: not the breakdown of a social contract but the production of a new contract in today’s India, one from which all Muslims, even children, are now affectively felt to be outside. In this case it is not simply that those present did not intervene to save Junaid and his friends from harm. This is common in India. Most people do not stop to intervene or help in a violent situation because they are scared. We should cease lamenting the indifference of “the Indian public” and ask instead what forms of obligation to strangers can exist in a society as radically unequal as ours. In this case then it is not that those present were indifferent to the public lynching of a 15 year old Muslim boy. They were not indifferent at all. Rather they made a collective agentive decision to abide by a common sense to not see the public savaging of a Muslim boy. The blind wall behind which Junaid’s body lies reflects a positive action on the part of the Hindus present to collectively agree to refuse him the most basic recognitions humanity (that is the force by which humans recognize each other as sharing a common being and bond) demands.

What are the social logics revealed on Asoti platform? What is the nature of these principles of willed unseeing to which the ordinary Hindus on Asoti platform seem to hold?
Anthropologists identify a fundamental organizational logic of human society, that of mutual exchange. Humans living in society, i.e. in a social order, enter into relations of exchange with other humans also living in society. Thus persons are those with whom one trades, barters, goes to war, enters into ties of mutual obligation and marries. Sometimes under extreme social torsion the principle of inter-social and inter-subjective mutuality breaks apart and certain groups are ejected out of the socio-political order. The force of the social as mutual exchange is withdrawn and they become humans with whom one does not marry, trade, go to war (since even warfare assumes negotiations) or exchange food, even what they eat ejected from the category of the edible. One does not respect their dead, revere their gods, nor recognize their marriages. In such circumstances these persons occupy a frightening new location in the social order. Towards such persons (prisoners captured in warfare, slaves, pacified populations) the forms of mutual exchange that undergird full membership in the social order are no longer operative. Instead another principle of social differentiation and interaction takes over- that of the hunter and the hunted. Social forms descend into bloody spirals of violence as former exchange partners withdraw social relations of mutuality and obligation. There is no more talking (the exchange of words), no more selling (the exchange of goods) and no more love (the exchange of kinship).

Such a notion may seem archaic, out of the pages of a yellowed structuralist text which once excelled in tracing the social logic of hunting and warfare in “non-state” (acephalic) societies. But we can discern the operations of this logic in modern polities. The hunting of black bodies that accompanied the conquest of Africa, the genocides that accompanied the founding of modern America and Australia. And a brief look at the bloody political history of the twentieth century shows us what happens when a hyper-nationalist militarized majority (the Sikh pogroms, Nazi Germany, Kosovo) begins hunting minorities. We saw the intimations of this logic – this experiment with open violence as a means of terrorizing Indian Muslims and Hindus into expelling Muslims from the national socio-political body in the Gujarat pogroms in 2002. At that time what struck and horrified a watching Indian public in this hyper-mediatized pogrom was the intimate and perverse nature of the violence directed at Muslim bodies. The rioting Hindus in Gujarat did not simply kill Muslims: they dismembered them with swords and knives. Pregnant women were ripped open, unborn fetuses thrown on fires. Mass rape accompanied by mutilation. The organic desecration of Muslim places of worship. North India is today Gujarat, except now the ruling dispensation does not need to incur the expense of a full blown pogrom since its organizing logics are abroad in the social body. Its operations can be discerned in the myriad ways in which vigilante Hindu meṅ are spreading across towns and villages in north India hunting Muslims for sport.

To return, we can and should locate this blindness of ordinary Hindus in the historical narrative we now know of the ascendancy of the Hindu Right as a social and political force in modern India. Yet the historical arc is what social scientists would call a necessary but insufficient explanation. Necessary because it is from out of this that what is coming will come. But it cannot explain the form it is taking- the peculiar horrifying quality by which non-pathological sane people cannot see the dead body of a child. Something more fundamental seems to have broken in today’s India.

As we have come to expect with the Narendra Modi regime and the national blindness it is imposing on the country, the central government has also refused to see Junaid’s body. The eyes of the state which see almost everything else did not see Junaid’s body as it lay on the platform and once it had been removed. The statements by functionaries of the state on what they did not see are instructive. Om Prakash, the Station Manager, managed to not see what was by his own admission a “huge crowd” gathered 200 ms away from his office. The two guards he sent to investigate this crowd which he himself could not see also did not see anything since by the time they had arrived 200 people had vanished. Bhagwat Dayal, the Post-Master, managed to be in two places at once and at none of them did he see anything: from his office he asked a railway officer to call an ambulance, while at the same time he was at home “relaxing”. And indeed the CCTV camera – that technology of unmediated sight normalized in public consciousness by the security state through the long decade of the 2000s- has by dint of being damaged no vision to offer. A field of invisibility in which it is impossible for Junaid’s body to be present is thus constructed through public agreement between the ordinary Hindus on this railway station and a state apparatus that has earned the necrotic distinction of blinding 1200 people in Kashmir within the past year. The ordinary Hindus at this station eschewed the use of their own eyes and turned them towards the purposes of the blind state.

From a purely social scientific viewpoint if we do not today as a society attend to the symptoms that reveal the ascendance of a logic of war against its own people incarnated within the social body, we are heading to mass slaughter. The public messaging by the current regime, and the silence of ordinary Hindus, has been well diagnosed by journalists. The BJP regime currently holding state power in the Sovereign Socialist Republic of India has declared through acquiescence, commission and omission that it is open hunting season on Muslims and Dalits. Two conclusions follow: 1) We are in a radical breakdown of the rule of law in BJP ruled India and in these regions mob rule now obtains. We are in the terror days of state supported goondaraj. From which flows the second conclusion: 2) On the 22nd of June 2017, the Republic effectively ended. India is no longer a secular constitutional republic but on the precipice of being transformed into a majoritarian state ruled by an ethnic and religious majority. The hunting of Muslims and Dalits in today’s India should concern every right thinking Indian because it demonstrates a prowling consuming violence aided and abetted by the Narendra Modi regime leaking through the social body. As all our public institutions erode under increasing assault, as the space of public discourse and exchange is vitiated through threat, coercion and open violence, we are teetering on the edge of becoming a country in which children are not safe on the trains. A country in which people run scared of what their neighbours think they are eating, and armed thugs patrol small town streets hunting young lovers. 15 year old Junaid’s body, the broken body of a young Muslim boy that ordinary Hindus chose to un-see, shows India the shape of things to come. We are 1.3 billion people spread over one of the largest contiguous landmasses in the world. Imagine the scale of social violence, what it will consume, what will be left, what can escape, once it begins. We should prepare for the future being put in place for us.

Courtesy: Kafilaonline
 

The post Why 200 Ordinary Hindus Did Not See A Dead Muslim Child On A Railway Station In North India appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Prem Singh : " I am fast on the day of Eid. I know this is not the custom. But Junaid's murder was committed just two days before Eid by mob-lynching. But as a citizen there was no other way to express my feeling of grief and shame.

With the hope that families of Junaid, Zafar Hussain and Pahlu Khan will find a better social atmosphere to observe next Eid, I would like to wish Eid Mubarak to all."

Image Courtesy: Aijaz Ashraf, Scroll.in

Today he issued this statement:

A number of colleagues from across the country have sent messages of solidarity, they have observed the fast in support. Several friends will join the fast at Jantar Mantar today.
In yesterday's fast young people were present in strong numbers. Young leaders including Yogesh Paswan, Bandana Pandey, Sadat Anwar, Shweta Rashmi, Laraib Akram spoke their minds and participated in the discussion.

Senior activists like Ravikiran Jain of the PUCL, Vimal Bhai (NAPM), Thomas Mathew, AK Maji, comrade Baldev Singh Sihag, Comrade Narendra, Navaid Hamid, Satish Kumar, Dr. MA Johar, Dr. Sunilam, Darshan Pal, Avik Saha, Sadat, Anwar, Amar Singh Amar, Tehseen Ahmed, Prof. Gopeshwar Singh, Prof. Sudha Singh, Prof. Ratan Lal, Prof.
Vipin Tripathi, Atul Sood, Navsran, Seema Baite, Renu Gambhir, Baba Vijender, Prof. Vipin Tripathi, Ramesh Chand Sharma, Dr. Tariq Ashraf too came and expressed their anxiety about the prevailing situation.

Giving the example of Gandhi, Prof. Vipin Tripathi explained that the biggest evil can be changed by the power of truth. Akram said that in earlier times parents used to advise caution at the time of leaving home. Now the young themselves fear while going out. The first need is to change this feeling of insecurity among people before making a call for any other revolution. Prof. Vipin Tripathi and Akram voiced similar apprehensions and suggestions. The moral health of society depends upon its
own strength and truth should be the strength of the society.
Yesterday Justice Sachar quarreled with me on phone because I had did not informed him about the fast. He has threatened to reach Jantar-Mantar today with a glass of juice!

I am fast on the day of Eid. I know this is not the custom. But Junaid's murder was committed just two days before Eid by mob-lynching. But as a citizen there was no other way to express my feeling of grief and shame.

With the hope that families of Junaid, Zafar Hussain and Pahlu Khan will find a better social atmosphere to observe next Eid, I would like to wish Eid Mubarak to all.

The post My Silent Protest is An Expression of Grief & Guilt against the Lynchings: Prem Singh, Socialist Party of India appeared first on SabrangIndia.

The systematic and ongoing targeting of Muslims, including three incidents of lynching in the last week and one killing by a policeman in Jharkhand, triggered a wave of protests in the social media. Flooded with hashtags like #StopKillingMuslims, #BlackEid, #StopLynchingMuslims and #EidWithBlackArmBand, the campaign called upon Muslims to wear black bands on their arms on Eid Day to protest against what looks like an unrelenting ‘Lynch in India’ menace.

Heeding the call, the brothers of 15-year-old Hafiz Junaid who was murdered by a lynch mob in the outskirts of Delhi last Friday and others from his village Khandawli in Faridabad, Haryana wore black bands on Eid. So did a large number of Muslims elsewhere.

Also read: On Eid ul Fitr, a Poem for the Late 15-Year-Old Hafiz Junaid.

The Indian Express reports: "As Muslims across Mewat observed a ‘black Eid’ to protest the violence against their community members, 23-year-old Irshad joined them with a black band on his arm. Irshad is the son of cattle farmer Pehlu Khan, who was lynched by a mob of alleged cow protection vigilantes in April. Almost two months after his father succumbed to his injuries, Irshad is disappointed that some of the accused are still free. Eid festivities in this region, populated by Meo Muslims, were dampened by the memory of that incident. “Tyauhar ki itni khushi nahi hai jitna in baaton ka gham hai (The joy of the festival has been dampened by the sorrow caused by these incidents),” said Irshad.

The proposed protest was backed by top officials from the Darul Uloom, Nadva, All India Muslim Majlis Mushawarat; Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, Jamiatul Ulema Hind, Jamiatul Ulema and prominent Muslims, including retired judges and civil servants, from across India.

Now, documentary film-maker and activist Anand Patwardhan has called upon all citizens to wear black badges for “at least a week”. “By itself the black ribbon is just a piece of cloth… [but] it is also a way to awaken the sleeping who think everything is fine”, reads Patwardhan’s message on Facebook.

Meanwhile, Sheikh Khurshid Alam, a lawyer from Kolkota urges Indian Muslims to go beyond “pointless protests”.

We reproduce below his article first published on Two Circles:

Amidst blaring Bollywood numbers doing a surgical strike through my windows, I am trying to pen down my thoughts on the proposed Black Band Protest against mob-lynching of people in general and Muslims in particular. Agreed, protest is vital to democracy but is there any point in protesting just for the sake of it?

Among those who would be protesting with their black bands on Eid, there will be such anti-socials who extort money from people to decorate the streets with stolen electricity and make the lives of their neighbours hell with loud music for all the three days of Eid and there will also be those good Muslims who choose to remain silent on every social issue of the locality but they will be very content with their Black Band Protest because they believe – “Kuch nahi karne se achcha kam se kam patti lagakar protest zahir to kiya!” (protesting with black bands on arms is better than not doing anything at all).

Quran says, “Let there arise out of you a group of people inviting to all that is good , enjoining Al-Ma‘roof and forbidding Al-Munkar (all that is bad). And it is they who are the successful.” Our protests lack spirit because we are selective and if not self-centric then at least community-centric or caste-centric or region-centric or ideology-centric. We do not invite to all that is good and neither forbid all that is bad. A life of a Communist or a Sanghi or a Hindu or a Dalit or any human being is as precious as that of a Muslim. In theory, there is no caste system in Islam but in practice there are places where upper caste Muslims don’t hesitate to ruin the lives of low caste Muslims and they cry foul when non-Muslims mistreat them.

Just because some Pratapgarhi or any visionless leader has appealed to Muslims to sport black bands on Eid Day, emotional fools that we are rush to such gimicks. What about the sanctity of Eid? It is human nature to adopt the easy way out. Sporting black band is one of those easy way out. Enjoining what is good and forbidding what is evil is obligatory upon all the Ummah, men and women, each according to his or her circumstances.

The Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said: “Whoever among you sees an evil action, let him change it with his hand [by taking action]; and if he cannot, then with his tongue [by speaking out]; and if he cannot, then with his heart [by feeling that it is wrong] – and that is the weakest of faith.” Why are we satisfied and content with the weakest display of our faith? Let’s not forget that good is the enemy of great. Ghalib has aptly said, “Haq to yeh hai ke haq ada na hua.” (the Truths is that we did not fulfill the rights).

We are in one of the best democracies of the world. Our democracy gives us the options like filing of PILs, complaint to NHRC or SHRCs, representation to the Executives, getting politically conscious of our rights and holding our elected representatives accountable for their breach of duties. Let’s ask ourselves that have we ever tried to change any evil by our actions first or we have limited ourselves to coffee table discussions and black band protests only! In spite of various cases and allegations of corruption in the Judiciary, it is still dispensing justice to the people of India. Why don’t the Muslim organizations include in their long term plans to encourage and support the entry of right minded youth in the Judiciary and Administration of the country? We need much more likes of Zakat Foundation of India.

These pointless protests will not lead us anywhere. The regime which has leased reign of terror will not be moved by our black bands. It has taken them more than 60 years of hardcore preparation to occupy the throne of Delhi and our able leadership should have the vision to prepare such efficient roadmaps to sail us through. In order to follow the teaching of our beloved Prophet to exhibit the highest level of faith, we need to empower ourselves likewise. Black band or No band, Eid Mubarak to all.

Sheikh Khurshid Alam is a Kolkata-based advocate.

This article was first published on Two Circles.

The post Call for all citizens to wear black bands for “at least a week”; Muslims must go beyond “pointless protests”, says lawyer appeared first on SabrangIndia.

 
Mohammad Ayub Pandith, the Deputy Superintendent of Police of Jammu and Kashmir, was lynched to death by an irate mob of around 200 Kashmiri Muslims outside the Jamia Masjid in Srinagar yesterday. On the same day, near the National Capital Region, Hafiz Junaid, a 15-year-old Muslim, was stabbed to death and his brothers, Hashim, Shakir Mohsin and Moin, were severely injured on a train from Tughlakabad, Delhi to Ballabhgarh, Haryana. Yesterday was just one of the many days where people have been converted to statistics and India into a slaughterhouse of identities.
 
It is saddening to see that while one act of violence targeted at a State official was highlighted, and rightly so, by media houses; another death of a Muslim teenager on a train by a mob that attacked his religious community received mere scanty attention and concern of the online press on the day of the incident. The media, in effectively privileging one murder over the other, prioritized one life over another as deserving of news space. In so doing, the free media has mirrored the political tide of casual indifference where the lynching of a Muslim boy is not treated with the same degree and extent of condemnation as that of the murder of a police officer. Since when did reportage have to be qualified by the identity of the deceased?
 
It is about time we take stock of the reasons for and nature of the attacks to understand how identities manage anxieties of distance and difference in India. The communally charged atmosphere of Srinagar witnessed rumors of a ‘non-Muslim’ police officer guarding the Jamia Masjid during Shab-e-Qadr, night-long prayers held during Ramzan. The rumors of the deceased non-Muslim DSP being on alleged surveillance duty and clicking photographs of people spread like vengeful and frustrated fire. On the other hand, Junaid’s death was a result of an alleged argument over seats in the passenger train, which eventually led to the attackers spewing communal slurs. One news report carries rumors of alleged beef-eating that instigated the attackers to stab and injure fellow passengers; another attributes the incident to a group of 15-20 people, who boarded the train at Okhla and hurled anti-Muslim comments at the four boys—mocking their dress, calling them beef-eaters, and deeming them undeserving of the train seats.
 
Both incidents scream hate crime and manifested themselves in the form of indefensible violence. The violence in Srinagar took the form of mob lynching as one of the assailants pierced the body of the DSP with a rod and then later dumped it in a drain. The police officer had pulled out his service revolver in self-defense and injured three in their lower limbs, but was overpowered by the strength of the aggravated mob that stripped him naked and beat him to death. Junaid was stabbed by a group of 15-20 men who carried knives on their person on a moving train. The altercation escalated as communal abuses were heaved and stabbings multiplied. The Muslim teenager was declared dead on arrival at the Civil Hospital in Palwal, while Shakir is presently admitted at the AIIMS Trauma Center, Delhi. Self-defense can take various forms, but the theoretical choice to defend oneself may not always materialize into a viable option, and the law discounts exactly that. Armed State agents always carry with them the plausibility and tools of defense that the common man may be deprived of, and this arguably raises questions on the manner in which the law of self-defense operates in our country where everyone may not be equally positioned (and equipped) to defend themselves.

 
Criminal law is a field of public law and any criminal offence is deemed to be a crime against the State and society at large. It is the State’s prerogative to protect the life, liberty and security of citizens, and any offence then is a reinforcement of the failure of the State to do so. In the case of Mohammad Ayub, his rumored religion was just one of the many aspects of his identity that he shouldered as he guarded the Jamia Masjid. As an officer of the State which is perceived as an active perpetrator of violence in Kashmir, Ayub was attacked arguably for more than his ostensible religion. While the wife of the deceased DSP wailed, “Your killers will face the same fate”; Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti termed the act as a “murder of trust” and hinted at how the police force cannot be exercising such restraint for too long. In an environment where the State is no longer perceived as the protector of its citizens evidenced by a history of State-sanctioned violence and brutality; the DSP’s lynching is then arguably a manifestation of an already murdered trust. Delhi (and the rest of India) then poses the daunting prospect of a Kashmir waiting to happen, as Hindu extremists and self-proclaimed cow vigilantes appropriate and/or are delegated the power to take law into their own hands. The trust deficit is further exemplified when repeated calls for help to the Government Railway Police (GRP) personnel, the police and the emergency response number were made all in vain. Surat Pal, the SHO of GRP at Ballabgarh Police Station is reported to have stated:
 
“One of them, Mohsin, called an ambulance when his brother was stabbed. Such things happen. Whenever there is a riot or fight, such things happen and people say some communal things, but we can't do anything”
 
When State instrumentalities normalize communal violence, and when office bearers fail and/or neglect to condemn all acts of violence indiscriminately (and not merely for political or strategic purposes), some lives are effectively valued more than others. In the case of the Jamia Masjid lynching, 12 persons have been identified and five of them have been arrested as per the statement of the Director General of Police S.P. Vaid. Moreover, a Special Investigation Team has been formed to expedite the probe into the lynching of Pandith. The FIR in the case of Junaid’s death has been registered under sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 324 (voluntarily causing hurt by dangerous weapons or means), 302 (murder) and 34 (common intention), Indian Penal Code, 1860. According to the Superintendent of the GRP Kamladeep Goyal, one of the assailants has been arrested and has confessed to the commission of the offence. Further, Goyal has also mentioned probing of alleged presence and complicity of one of the officers at Ballabgarsh who did nothing to save Junaid when the train stopped.
 
While the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir Mehbooba Mufti as well as the National Conference Working President Omar Abdullah have both strongly condemned the murder of the police officer as an unimaginable travesty and the height of barbarism, scanty political attention has been drawn to condemning the act of violence on the train to Ballabhgarh. In the otherwise selectively silent violence of the ruling government, the strong condemnation of the Ballabgarh incident by Union Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu is however, welcome.
 
Deputy Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir Nirmal Singh is quoted to have said:
 
“I condemn it [the lynching of DSP Pandith] in the strongest words because it's a crime. It's a murder. The government will take it in that way and the police will take a strong action against them.”
 
Both, the lynching of the DSP and the stabbing of a Muslim teenager who had gone Eid shopping, are condemnable crimes. Both are murders and neither of them should attain coverage or be subjected to censure discriminately. The value and sanctity of human life cannot afford politicisation.    
 
Vatsal Gosalia is a student (NLU Mumbai) and Vandita Khanna, a student of the Jindal Global Law School

The post Pandith in Srinagar & Junaid in Ballabhgarh: Comparing a Yesterday of Violence appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Victims, shocked and injured received no response from the Emergency Police and Helpline numbers and have further alleged that the GRP (railway police force) at Ballabgarh railway station stood by and refused to help

India will soon need to develop it’s own Lynch Calendar. Who is killed When in which City. Identities will probably always be Muslim, sometimes Dalit. But the ideological identities of the killer will escape public knowledge. Deliberately.

Three days before Ramzan Eid, on the last Friday of the Holy Month of Ramzan, a Muslim family was attacked in a local train on the outskirts of Delhi, India’s capital leading to the death of Junaid, a 15 year old student and serious stab injuries to his brother 22 year old Shakir. The third brother Hashim was also injured. The men who led the slogan shouting mob attacked them with large knives.

India Today reports that young Junaid was lynched and 3 others brutally thrashed over rumours of beef eating on Delhi-Ballabhgarh train routeThe four had come to Delhi from their village in Haryana for shopping ahead of Eid.

These young men boarded a local train at Delhi around 5 pm for Ballabhgarh, Haryana. Junaid and his younger brother are students in a Madrassa in Surat and were home on their annual visit during Eid. ‘Some men’ who got on at Tughlaqabad started abusing them using filthy communal language. When they protested they were brutally attacked amidst shouting of communal slogans.  Junaid was beaten to death in the train.

Where were the Railway Police?

The four men have been identified as Junaid, Hashim, Shakir Mohsin and Moin of Khandavali village in Ballabgarh. They had boarded a train from Tughlakabad in Delhi. They were later thrown out of the train at Asavati railway station as train left for Mathura. They were taken to Palwal hospital where Junaid was declared brought dead. Shakir and Hashim are still in hospital.  

Mohsin in his statement said that all of them had gone to Delhi for Eid shopping. They boarded a passenger train.  According to Mohsin's statement, soon after they boarded the train some passengers started abusing them. When they resisted, they were beaten up. A huge crowd attacked them.

Two suspects were carrying knives with them and stabbed the four, Mohsin said in his statement. They called police and emergency response number but to no avail. Mohsin further claimed that they tried to pull the chain to stop the train but failed. He also said GRP personnel at Ballabgarh railway station refused to help them when they told them what happened on the train.

‘The mob’ then tried to pull out Shaikr’s beard. He was stabbed in three places The badly injured victims were not allowed to get off at Ballabhgarh. They were literally thrown off the train. Some people later found them and took them to the hospital.

The CPI-M has issues a strong statement condemning the incident stating that ‘this communally motivated crime shows that the BJP-RSS rule is leading to communal mob actions.’ The statement also says that there’ have been earlier incidents of violence against Muslims on trains but Government has not acted to uphold the law of the land, thus directly encouraging the growth of such communal hate crimes.’

CPI(M) Polit Bureau members Brinda Karat and M.P. Md. Salim and DelhiSecretariat member Asha  Sharma met the family in hospital in Delhi this morning. The statement says it all. ‘It is shameful and condemnable that the Government and specifically the Prime Minister and the Home Minister have maintained a deafening silence and not a single officer has been deputed to even visit the family.’

Not only should strict action be taken against the guilty. The CPI-M has demanded adequate compensation for the family. It calls for strong protest actions against such
communally motivated crimes, especially in public spaces.
 
 
 

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