Court to hear plea from Hindus demanding to worship in Gyanvapi Mosque
Hindu supremacist petitioners won a major victory in their attempt to convert the 17th-century Gyanvapi mosque in Uttar Pradesh state into a temple. A court agreed to hear the petition of five women who demanded that they be allowed to perform Hindu rituals at an alleged shrine inside the mosque. The plea will be heard on September 22.
The Hindu women backed by Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) affiliates allege that there are idols in the mosque, a claim that the mosque committee has rejected.
The ruling has led to communal tensions in the area, resulting in increasing police patrolling around the mosque.
Gyanvapi mosque has been on the Hindu extremists’ radar for decades. Recently, Hindu supremacist groups started falsely claiming that a Shivling, or a representation of the Hindu deity Shiva, was in the mosque. Following this claim, Hindu extremist groups demanded that the mosque be converted into a temple or opened up for Hindus to worship.
Muslims have already been banned from holding large prayer gatherings in the mosque to protect the alleged Shivling, which the mosque caretakers claim is merely a faucet. The Supreme Court has failed to intervene and protect the Muslim community’s right to maintain the sanctity of their mosque, instead turning the case over to a judge in Uttar Pradesh, which is tightly controlled by the Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Supreme Court once again delays hearing challenges to discriminatory CAA
In a continued show of meekness before the Hindu supremacist government of Narendra Modi, the Supreme Court has once again delayed hearing at least 220 challenges to the discriminatory anti-Muslim Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).
The pleas against the CAA first came up for hearing in the Supreme Court in December 2019, making this a delay of over two years.
The CAA fast-tracks citizenship for all religious groups except Muslims, putting millions of Muslims at risk of mass statelessness. The international community criticized the bill as discriminatory, including human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.
Muslims who peacefully protested against the CAA were met with police brutality, Hindu supremacist mob violence, and judicial harassment.
Supreme Court dismisses plea from family of Kashmiri victim of extrajudicial killing
The Supreme Court failed to provide justice to the family of Amir Magray, a Kashmiri victim of extrajudicial killing, by rejecting a plea by his father seeking direction to police to allow the exhumation and return of his son’s body.
“There is “nothing” on record “to indicate that [the] deceased… was not given a decent burial,” said the bench, sticking to claims by Indian forces that Margray was a “terrorist.”
However, Margray’s family has staunchly disputed this claim, saying that government forces killed 23-year-old Margray in November of 2021 and that his death was “a cold-blooded fake encounter.”
“I only want justice. I only want the body of my son. Whatever happens after that, I don’t care,” said Margray’s father, Muhammad Lateef Magray.
Indian police forces have been responsible for the wanton killing and arrest of Kashmiri civilians since the abrogation of Article 370 of the Indian constitution in 2019, which had granted India’s only Muslim-majority state semi-autonomy.
New Jersey church cancels event featuring Hindu supremacist leader
A church in New Jersey cancelled an event featuring Hindu supremacist leader Sadhvi Rithambara after an outcry from Indian Americans.
Ritambhara is the leader of Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), one of India’s largest Hindu supremacist organizations. The organization has a long history of committing violent crimes against Indian minorities, including mob lynchings, looting minority-owned homes, raping women from minority communities, targeting church congregations with physical violence, and arsoning mosques.
Ritambhara has also called for Christians to be “wiped out of India” and urged Hindu mobs to tear down the historic Babri Masjid.
The church and local authorities were informed of Rithambara’s background by the New Jersey chapters of the Indian American Muslim Council (IAMC) and Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), as well as by American Muslims for Democracy (AMD) and Hindus for Human Rights.
Reverend Robert Miller said he revoked approval to use the church building after receiving over 1,000 emails and over 100 phone calls urging the church authorities not to platform a Hindu supremacist who has openly called for violence against Muslims and Christians.
