A dreadful incident took place at the train in North Indian State of Haryana , when a fifteen year old boy Junaid Khan was stabbed to death and his three brothers were injured when the knife wielding mob of around 20 people attacked them inside a train on account of a dispute over a seat.
One of the accused arrested in this case said on TV that he was compelled into this as Muslims eat beef.
As per Shaqir one of the surviving brothers the attackers, “Flung our skull caps, pulled my brother’s beard, slapped us and taunted us about eating beef.”
Considered sacred by many Hindus, cows and their slaughter have become a sensitive topic across the country and is responsible in the widening of religious divisions under Narendra Modi’s Hindu Nationalist BJP.
As two years ago, a farm worker Mohammed Akhlaq was killed by a mob on account of rumours that he and his family was responsible for storing and eating beef.
In the recent years, cow vigilantism has resulted in the increase of violence across the country as Muslim men have been lynched by Hindu mobs mostly in the states ruled by BJP government. Many are questioning the Prime minister’s silence over the killings and there is sudden breakdown of law and order as the protection of minorities is a major concerned issue.
The local police station chief told Times of India that they failed to rescue the boy because of the crowd.
On the death of a 55 year old farmer Pehlu khan as a result of lynching, the chief minister of BJP ruled Rajasthan said he had “no regrets” over the killing as he was a cow smuggler.
Such incidents are a setback for a democratic nation like India and this is further incremented when Rajeev Mehrishi, senior most bureaucrat in charge of law and order, accused media for exaggerating such incidents.
Mob lynching is not a novel concept to the people of India. History has substantial instances to prove that this country has been a victim of mob lynching since long. For instance, more than 630 people were killed between 1982 and 1984 by mob during the communist rule in West Bengal.
Mob lynching is a adding a bad name to BJP government and Mr. Narendra Modi , as many is wondering that India is staring into a troublous and peril state as leaders fail to condemn hate crimes and rest stay silent without realizing that small scale and large scale violence are intimately connected.
“Every act of violence that you tolerate without protest brings it a step closer to your doorstep. It is because small violence is tolerated that big violence is rendered possible,” writes Sudipta kaviraj from Columbia University.
