Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (SHP)

Bengaluru, Jul 17: A constant rise in the cases associated with lynching has been observed in Uttar Pradesh. Unfortunately, in the same category, Karnataka has quietly emerged as the second-biggest state in India for hate crimes after Uttar Pradesh and Dakshina Kannada is top in the list of districts of India in hate crimes.

Harsh Mander, noted activist and director of the Centre for Equity Studies in New Delhi, pointed out this grave piece of information during a panel discussion in Bengaluru on Tuesday. He spoke about the growing intolerance in India. “The situation in Karnataka is much worse. Figures show Dakshina Kannada as the number one district in the country for hate crimes,” Mander added.

According to Sharib Ali of the Quill Foundation, which documented hate crimes in the country for over a five years stated that since 2014, 948 incidents of hate crimes were reported including 117 cases of lynching, 258 physical assaults, couple cases of communal tension, few cases of harassment and several other mosque and church related attacks have been taking place. The nationwide number of victims stands at 11,722, with 108 people getting killed. Karnataka saw 111 incidents and 553 victims.

Mander referred it to as a ‘dangerous trend’, and explicitly linked the spike in violence to the far-right rhetoric of the Modi regime. “They are legitimizing hatred for minorities that we did not know existed,” he said and classified the choice of voters in 2019 elections to be catastrophic for the country’s social fabric. “India could have voted for progress, salvaging an economy in shambles and confronting the rising farm distress. Instead, it chose to vote in favour of masculine Hindutva,” he added.

While Ali pointed that under the Modi regime a climate was being created where violence was glamorized and the people responsible for it were lauded. “But at the core, lynching is an act of reconstructing social order to show minorities their place,” he added. Meanwhile, Mander compared the current situation of India to Germany during the Nazi rule. “After the war ended, young Germans asked their parents why they did not stop the Nazis from persecuting the Jews and trying to conquer Europe. Their answer then was ‘we did not know'. “We in India do not have the luxury of such ignorance,” he said. 

Mander brought forward an incident from 1947, one where Gandhi was invited to visit Pakistan. It was the time when Gandhi turned down the offer claiming he would not leave Delhi until every Muslim child living in India could walk the streets without fear.

Mander spoke about the lynching of the 16-year-old son of an Imam at Asansol, which reportedly prompted the local Muslim community to protect Hindu homes and shops so as to contain the inflammatory situation was a tear-jerker for all. The violence asserted by mob that carry out crimes such as lynching are reflective of the fact that Mahatma Gandhi’s work is still incomplete, Mander regretted.