Alienation of minorities: Whither Raj Dharma?

Punjab and Haryana High Court has restrained the Haryana government from conducting a demolition drive in the state’s Nuh district which was marred by communal violence last week. The High Court headed by Justice G S Sandhawalia took suo moto cognizance of the matter and asked the state government not to carry out any further demolition exercise until further orders. The Nuh Administration has demolished over 750 properties including houses, shops and illegal structures so far in its drive against encroachments . All the demolished structures had been built on government land and had been used by suspects of recent communal riots. Those demolished included an ‘illegal’ colony of 250 shanties in Tauru. No doubt, action against encroachments is always justified and it has to be carried out. But all these illegal structures have been in place for years and the authorities had not bothered to look at them. Such illegal and extra-legal constructions are part of our corrupt culture and we have allowed it in the country. The less powerful always have suffered whenever such administrations wake up all of a sudden.

But, these demolitions have become common nowadays under a new vigilantism of the BJP governments. (Of course, we had the Rajasthan Congress government, too, resorting to such demolitions of the majority community in the past). This is all bulldozer baba’s influence. Admittedly, some properties belonging to the majority communities also meet the same fate but the action is always selective. This particular High Court took suo motu cognizance of the situation and questioned the authority whether it was a form of ethnic cleansing. Because, in Nuh the clashes which resulted due to stone pelting on a majority community’s religious procession led to widespread violence later. Members of both the communities were responsible for the hate crimes in the communal clashes. However, action was limited to minority community’s properties.

Elsewhere migrant labour from Bengal has been threatened to ‘go back’ to their villages because of their religious identity. On the other hand, the Haryana government says that the riots were well planned and, perhaps, a deeper conspiracy was behind it. There were also hints of the hand of cyber crime criminals. The region is known for such activity and if a crackdown is taking place against such crimes and criminals, then the government should have been prepared for a backlash, too.

Why communal action against communal riots? A community is being held to ransom in this country for the crimes committed by someone in the past. Dichotomy over the BJP stand on minorities is self-evident in the proclamations it makes often. Triple talaq (instant divorce) and talaq-e-mughallazah (irrevocable divorce) are now-banned means of Islamic divorce previously available to Muslims in India, especially adherents of Hanafi Sunni Islamic schools of jurisprudence.

The BJP earned the sympathy of the Muslim women and benefited in the UP elections. Following the proposal of NRC and CAA, it lost the benefit with Shaheen Bagh becoming the epicentre of Minority women protest. Now it talks of Pasmanda Muslims and Ashrafis and their ‘Bhagidaari’ in the development. The party is only attempting to divide the Muslims. The ruling party should realize that it is not they

who require the Muslim support. It is our country that needs it. You can’t go on alienating nearly 14 per cent of the population of India and still talk of making it a developed country.