The Rise of Hindrabia

'This is a story I have narrated, but it bears repeating. Not 50 metres from the Hajee Sir Ismail Sait mosque in my east Bangalore neighbourhood of Richards Town is the Lusitania cold storage. You can buy pork chops, ox tongue, roast beef and a variety of other meat products. The homes behind Lusitania are overwhelmingly inhabited by Muslims, with a reasonable scattering of Hindus and Christians. So it is all across Bangalore’s old cantonment areas. Pork shops are close to mosques, restaurants with beef on their menu are next to Hindu homes – and no one has ever cared. There are no religious riots, although religion is very much a public affair...

I am aware that my neighbourhood is an island in a state that, between 2010 and 2014, witnessed the most religious conflicts as a proportion of population, according to data tabled in Parliament. Run by the Congress, and before that the BJP, Karnataka is a good illustration of the ugly turn that Hindu society is beginning to take. A series of riots and hate crimes were reported this year, all sparked by either trivial or deliberate acts of insensitivity or hatred.

Last week, a bunch of goons in a downtown Bangalore restaurant menaced Mathew Gordon, an Australian tourist, for having a tatoo of the goddess Yellamma on his shin. In India’s new offence-taking culture – emboldened by a feeling of impunity, if you happen to be Hindu – a group of 25 men threatened to “skin” Gordon, the Deccan Chronicle reported. The police detained the 21-year-old and forced him to write a letter of apology. “This is India,” an officer said in justification. On his Facebook page, Gordon wrote that “it is apparently acceptable to be harrassed, threatened and mobbed”.

Indeed, it is, the perversion of a Hindu culture rapidly taking on the hues of radical Islam. Slights are imagined, conspiracies alleged, harm threatened and murder justified by quoting, or misquoting, ancient scripture. Those who commit or support these acts believe Hinduism is infallible. Uttar Pradesh, the state with the most religious conflict, is full of angry young Hindu men, mobilised through social media into dark organisations with beliefs that make the RSS appear like a congenial kitty party. Some assertions: Disenfranchise Muslims, rape or convert their women, hang beef-eaters. Even among more urbane hate-mongers, to the assertion that a secular democracy should not ban beef, the response I get is, would you dare eat pork in Dubai or Saudi Arabia (both Islamic kingdoms)? The reasonable answer: In Dubai you can, and India should never want to become a Hindu Arabia. But India has started down that road, and reason is a futile response...

What is new is that after Modi’s coming, the BJP’s fringe has rapidly gone mainstream, dangerously widening the cracks in the dam. If the home minister declares his government will use all its “might” to ban cow slaughter nationally, it is no surprise that a sectarian murder with no justification becomes, variously, a minor incident, a spontaneous act, an accident. With a Prime Minister who has, in the past, mocked minorities, silence or reluctant censure is not a surprising reaction...' (Read full article.)