I was too young to change the world, but I quickly realized I could make small changes in my own life, and in my family’s, to keep us safe. Simple things became acts of survival.
I urged my abba to permanently turn off the Athan (call to prayer) reminders on his phone. Any visible markers that could identify us as Muslim in public needed to be erased -- the topi (skull cap) was left behind, and prayers were confined to designated spaces like airport prayer halls. Even carrying something as innocuous as chicken in a tiffin box became a risk not worth taking.
As I grew older and entered journalism, the reports of attacks became relentless, and I was bombarded daily with news reports and baseless conspiracies like Love Jihad and Thook Jihad (Translation: Spit Jihad). It felt like living in a never-ending game of whack-a-mole, always trying to stay one step ahead of potential danger and conspiracies.
I had to constantly ask myself, How can I avoid becoming the next target? Should I even attend the birthday party of a Hindu friend? And if I do, she’s a woman -- what if someone assumes I have some ulterior motive? Am I being overly paranoid? Absolutely not.
This has happened to other Muslim kids, and there’s no reason to believe it couldn’t happen to me. I also made sure to avoid other potential risks, like steering clear of buying books with certain provocative titles. Some authors publish works with catchy, attention-grabbing names like How to Kill a Democracy, How Propaganda Works, or The Anarchist Cookbook.
It’s not a critique of these authors -- they’re writing on important topics. But as a Muslim man, I understand all too well that in the eyes of law enforcement -- if I am ever found in possession of such books -- the content of these books won’t matter. The title alone is enough to cast suspicion, to brand me a terrorist, a foreign spy, or whatever label is most convenient at the moment.
It’s not just books, either. I’ve deliberately chosen not to run any form of community or clubs or even create something as simple as innocuous as a WhatsApp group and continue to be its admin. In today’s climate, anything and everything can be framed as a medium for radicalization. A simple discussion group could be twisted into something sinister by those eager to fit a narrative of Muslim extremism.
Living in this kind of fear doesn’t just change your behaviour, it changes the way you see the world. Every decision, no matter how trivial, feels fraught with the possibility of violence, misunderstanding, or worse. It’s a constant negotiation between staying true to your identity and staying safe.
On days when I’m swamped with work and my beloved mother goes to the market alone in her burqa, my heart sinks with fear. I’m consumed with worry that someone might attack her, and this constant anxiety gnaws at me, robbing me of sleep.
How could I rest, knowing the dangers that lurk? Just last year, a Railway Protection Force officer shot dead three Muslims and a Hindu colleague, praising Prime Minister Narendra Modi right after the killings. These aren’t nightmares or irrational fears -- this is the grim reality we live in.
In 2017, a 16-year-old boy, Junaid Khan, was stabbed to death on a train by a mob accusing him and his companions of carrying beef in their bags. And just last year, in early September, 72-year-old Haji Ashraf Ali Sayyed was physically by a group of men on a train. These incidents aren’t isolated -- they are part of the terrifying world we navigate daily.
Every time my mother steps outside, I wonder if she will return safely. This is our reality, not just in news reports or distant tragedies, but in the very fabric of our everyday lives. What’s even more horrifying is that today mass violence has been replaced, and the scale of riots that happened in the 80s and 90s is now a rare occurrence. The violence today happens in pockets, they are self-contained so that people move past it quickly. It’s more effective without creating a global embarrassment and continues to strike terror in our hearts.
In late September, a three-year-old girl and her mother died in Maharashtra’s Latur after five men in a car allegedly ran over a Muslim family travelling on a motorcycle. The men had chased the Muslim family for 5km following an argument over driving.
Sadique Shaikh, who was riding the motorcycle, has alleged that the men who chased him and his family had also used communal slurs and said “Muslims need to be taught a lesson.”
Sometimes I find myself wondering -- what if Modi were no longer in power? Would it really change anything? Would the fear, the bigotry, the oppression vanish the way the hijab ban slowly disappeared in Karnataka after a regime change? A part of me wants to hold on to that hope, to believe that a shift in leadership could lead to a shift in the atmosphere. But deep down, I know I’m asking for too much.
The truth is, that the fabric of Indian society has been altered in ways that go far beyond any one political leader. The hate, the divisiveness, and the systemic discrimination we see today are not just the products of the last decade -- they are the culmination of nearly a century of groundwork laid by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the ideological wing of the BJP. This isn’t just a political era, it’s the result of a long and calculated project designed to inject communal hatred into the very DNA of the nation.
Even if Modi were to go, the structures that uphold this hate -- the ideologies, the institutions, the social norms -- are deeply entrenched. It’s a machine that has been running for generations, and it won’t stop just because the figurehead changes. It’s heartbreaking to admit, but reversing this damage could take another century, if not more. I want to be hopeful, I want to believe that change is possible, but when the roots of hate have been nurtured for so long, it’s hard to imagine an India that can easily untangle itself from this darkness.
When I started writing this, I thought I would pour my heart into it -- lay out my anxieties, one by one, as if that would somehow release the weight. This was going to be my therapy, my experiment to free myself of these sleepless nights. But as I made progress, I found myself spiralling.
I don’t want to face this reality. I just want to rest, or maybe fall into a long sleep and wake up in some distant, possible future where all of this is over. The mental agony is unbearable. It feels as though we are chronicling our own demise, recording the slow disintegration of our lives, our dignity, and our self-respect. What we once held dear, the pride and honour we had in ourselves, has been pushed so far to the background that it’s barely recognizable.
Now, survival and securing a future for the next generation have become the only priorities. Like so many others, I feel like a sheep, driven by one overwhelming instinct -- to protect the people I love. Everything else, every dream, every aspiration I once held, has been let go. I have surrendered it all in the face of a world that seems intent on erasing us.
My ambitions now feel irrelevant, replaced by a primal need to shield my family from the relentless hate that surrounds us. As I write this, I fear and wonder, is my home going to be the next home that is demolished using a bulldozer? Would I ever forgive myself if I ended up being the reason my parents did not have a roof over their heads?
It’s exhausting, knowing that just existing, just trying to live a quiet life, can be an act of resistance, or is it? Every day, I’m weighed down by the uncertainty of what comes next. Will it get better? Or is this the future we are forced to accept -- one where our dreams are sacrificed at the altar of survival, where the only victory is making it through another day without incident? I want to believe in something brighter, but that belief is slipping away, and I don’t know if I’ll ever get it back.
Kalim Ahmed is a columnist and open-source researcher specialising in technology, meme culture and disinformation. A version of this article was previously published on Maktoob Media and has been reprinted under special arrangement.
