Polarisation of India

Mobilisation of India is the need of the hour, not polarisation of India. Often we hear RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat claiming he has been misinterpreted.

Bhagwat may be more holistic in his outlook and more egalitarian in his attitude, but a Mahant Adityanath, a Giriraj Singh and Sadhvi Prachi need not be so and definitely are not.

That is the real trouble. Narendra Modi and Amit Shah duo also may not be aware of these as they are far too busy handling bigger issues.

Behind their backs, the likes of Mahant Adityanath, the BJP MP of Gorakhpur, are running a campaign for "controlling the population of Muslims" which is being countered aggressively by the likes of Azam Khans and Owaisis

The beginning of this week saw our Prime Minister Narendra Modi enacting one of his biggest, brightest and by far the best stage shows to woo NRIs and foreign investors to the country to digitalise it, particularly the rural India. Excited well-to-do Siliconians kept chanting “Modi, Modi, Modi" as the Prime Minister was unveiling his vision of emerging India to an international audience.

Some 7,988 miles away from this Town Hall performance, abutting one of India's most digitalised city neighbourhoods and in the midst of a matching prosperity, another script of ‘Make in India’ was being readied in a small temple of Bisara village in Dadri in Greater Noida of the National Capital Region.

If supremacy of India was central to the theme of Modi at the Western US city, in this village, Bisara, on the fringe of the Western UP, supremacy of Hindus occupied the centre-stage at Bisara when a 50-year old Mohammad Ikhlaq was killed and his son was beaten to a pulp over a rumour that they ate beef. Is eating beef a sin in this country? Yes, some in the village thought as it is a Hindu majority village.

Hence, when someone complained of a calf missing from his field last week only to discover its carcass, all those who feasted on mutton on Bakrid day at Ikhlaq's place, gathered to hold someone accountable.

There were a couple of questions making rounds last Monday at the Shiv Mandir in the village. Who could do it to a cow or calf in the village of Hindus? Of course, it could be only Ikhlaq, the Muslim, they felt. “Has not he been chased when he was carrying a polythene cover with the remains of the calf?” Everyone agreed, reports suggest. No one verifies whether it is true.

The public address system of the Mandir consolidated the rumour and in no time a crowd barged into the home of Ikhlaq, their dear friend of all these years, only to find "beef" in the refrigerator and to bludgeon him to death and thrash his other family members with the bricks found in the house. Ikhlaq's son is in a near-death stage in a hospital now.

If you think Bisara is a remote backward village in UP you are wrong. The surroundings of Bisara or Dadri are no different from the Silicon Valley setting. Name any company of California, one can see its Indian headquarters in a sprawling yet spiralling towers nearby as these are all part of an extended Greater Noida.

Households here are considered to be rich and farmers here are the envy of their counterparts elsewhere in the country.These are all usually peace loving people of various communities living together happily all these days. Yet, in the past few months, youth of these villages are being inspired to reinvent the social fabric and its moorings to suit the 'majority' lifestyle.

Cattle thefts are common in these areas, but locals were never the suspects. Eating habits were purely personal and have never been any concern of the neighbours.However, Dr Mahesh Sharma, the Union Cultural Minister, who hails from Greater Noida, does not read much into the killing and says "it is only because of a misunderstanding.

There are incidents of cattle thefts in these areas and slaughter and this attack could have been because of it", he adds. But who will account for the setting up of Samadhan Sena, a little known organisation, active in these areas in the last four months. This Sena set up by one Govind Choudhary, a resident of Virpura village nearby, is a "nuisance in this area" say some of the locals including its Pradhaan, Aman.

A visit to yet another village, Jarcha, reveals that this Choudhary was holding meetings with a scores of the youth at least every now and then. The intellectual discourses in these meetings always centred around cow slaughter and the dwindling population of Hindus.

The result is this: Jarcha elects Ehasan Ilahi, as Pradhaan and has no problem working under him all these months. His son, Adil, decides to open a small repair shop of fans in the village. He is attacked and forced to close business because the land on which the shop was located is meant for Hindus.

The lynching of Arif, Anas and Nazim in Kaimrala town two months ago for cattle smuggling largely went unnoticed. It is not that the police is unaware of what is happening to these parts of UP. "After, Muzzafarnagar, they are targeting the communal harmony here. Several small splinter groups and organisations have come up", the police top brass of Gautam Buddh Nagar admits (Gautam Buddh Nagar is NOIDA).

There is another village simmering across and is ready to erupt - Kalaunda village. The priest of the temple in Kalaunda was brainwashed by Samadhan Sanstha into erecting a public address system only to play bhajans and keertans during the Azaan time. Please note that Kalaunda's Pradhaan too is a Muslim, Hashmat Haji.

Ask Badshah Ali, Pradhaan of Cholas village, slightly ahead of these above mentioned villages. He rues the "troubled times". "We never felt insecure. Hindus and Muslims are inter-dependent communities. But, children are talking a different language now. Their concerns have changed from films to the alleged decline in Hindu population" he admits referring to a communal clash because of a spat between two five-year olds.

In villages across the Gangetic plains, a sinister design is at work. A legal meat ban during a Jain festival "Paryushan" in the States of Gujarat, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Punjab is slowly acquiring alarming proportions with local communities attempting to impose hitherto unheard of codes of conduct, not just in public life but also in private lives.

Hoodwinking the governments and the courts for some could be easy in this country, but not in these neighbourhoods when a diktat is passed.The politics of meat and population are replacing the old discourses like Ram Janam Bhoomi etc far more effectively because of their relevance value.

Organisations active in Eastern Uttar Pradesh have spread to Western UP. The earlier political divide is paving way to a communal divide, with every clash, argument and public face-off of individuals acquiring communal overtones thanks to a "pro-active local media".

Narendra Modi and Amit Shah duo may not be aware of these as they are far too busy handling bigger issues. Behind their backs, the likes of Mahant Adityanath, the BJP MP of Gorakhpur, are running a campaign for "controlling the population of Muslims" which is being countered aggressively by the likes of Azam Khans and Owaisis.

The RSS is all set to review the census data on religious communities this October at Ranchi.To establish smart cities and Silicon Valleys across India, not just business ethos but also social ethos matter. What do all those Zuckerbergs and other honchos of Google, Facebook, Cisco, Adobe, eBay or Symantec do in India store in their kitchen storage places? Mobilisation of India is the need of the hour, not polarisation of India.

Often we hear Mohan Bhagwat claiming he has been misinterpreted. Bhagwat may be more holistic in his outlook and more egalitarian in his attitude, but a Mahant Adityanath, a Giriraj Singh and Sadhvi Prachi need not be so and definitely are not. That is the real trouble.

Someone running a Sanatan Sanstha or Samadhan Sena are of the opinion that they are more elitist and hence want to dictate the course of the history.Modi's dream of digitalisation process with 'Sabka Saath' for 'Sabka Vikas' and the goals of these intolerant fringe groups cannot be on the same page. Have a look at what is being made in India, Modiji!

By:W Chandrakanth