Anti-Namaz drives leave Muslims two choices: ‘Stick to ghettos or fall in line’ – By Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay
The concerted campaign by Hindu right-wing activists against Friday Namaz in public places in Gurugram, its tacit endorsement by state and district officials and institutions, and the recent so-very-coincident provocative speech by Union Home Minister Amit Shah in Uttarakhand, are aimed at ‘invisibilisation’ of Muslims. The intention is to force their retreat from shared civic spaces over which every Indian citizen has equal right.
Although separated by two generations and following divergent political paths into the sangh parivar, Shah and Kapil Mishra, the most noticeable personality associated with the majoritarian push in Gurugram, are two sides of the same political currency with which electoral transactions are consistently sought to be made by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)….
The belief behind this campaign is that this would leave Muslims with two choices. One to either accept their lot as it is and the other is to shift to a ghetto or Muslim-majority locality. That this movement has not just support but direct participation of a person as important as the union home minister, is indicative of the direction in which India is heading. But then, are not elections due in Uttarakhand and other states?
