The murder by a Hindu mob of a Muslim man rumoured to have slaughtered a cow has thrown a spotlight on the hardline, polarising agenda of some followers of Indian Prime Minster Narendra Modi, undermining his promise of development for all.
On a tour of Silicon Valley last month where he was feted by US tech gurus and Indian emigres, Modi won a pledge from Microsoft to provide low-cost Internet for 500,000 villages to back his vision of a globally networked “Digital India.”
One such village is Bisara, 50km from the capital New Delhi, where a crowd of assailants broke into Mohammed Akhlaq’s home last Monday night, beat him to death and dragged his body out into the street.
The local member of parliament, Mahesh Sharma, is also Modi’s culture minister and has hit the headlines of late with statements that show a different side to their ruling Hindu nationalist party. Visiting Bisara this week to pay his respects to Akhlaq’s family, Sharma said the killing could have been an “accident.”
Critics say Sharma’s comment implicitly condoned Akhlaq’s lynching and pandered to fringe Hindu militants who have recently become active in the district.
Blood on the walls
Communal clashes had never erupted in Bisara, home to 400 landowning Hindu and 35 Muslim families. But an announcement by a Hindu priest over his temple loudspeakers that Akhlaq had butchered a cow and that his wife was cooking beef for dinner brought a sudden end to the village’s tradition of tolerance.
Akhlaq’s youngest son, who suffered severe head injuries, is fighting for his life in a hospital intensive care unit after undergoing two brain surgeries.
Premeditated attack?
Local Muslims say Akhlaq’s killing was a pre-meditated attack aimed at polarising the village on religious lines by militant Hindu groups loyal to Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which won power in the May 2014 general election.
Sharma and Modi are both members of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), BJP’s ideological parent. The movement propagates an ideology of Hindutva, or Hindu-ness, which asserts that India is a Hindu nation.
The region holds village council elections next week and Bisara has, in the wake of the killing, become a magnet for campaigning politicians.
Many Indian states, including the country’s largest Uttar Pradesh, where Bisara is situated, have banned cow slaughter for more than two decades.
Modi’s party has, in states where it rules, clamped down further on eating beef - even though India is the second largest exporter and fifth biggest consumer in the world. In recent months, government leaders have advocated a national ban on cow slaughter.
Beef vigilantes
Critics say tougher anti-beef laws discriminate against Muslims, Christians and lower-caste Hindus who rely on the cheap meat for protein.
The crackdown has, meanwhile, provided cover for the rise of Hindu vigilante groups.
Such groups attack cattle trucks, track religious conversions in villages and towns, and warn Hindu girls against falling in love with Muslim boys. Modi has expressed no disapproval towards them.
Sharma’s office said the minister was demanding an independent federal investigation into Akhlaq’s murder. Calls on Sunday to three officials in Modi’s office went unanswered.
