Nazir Ahmed
The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been working to turn India into a Hindutva (Hindu nationalist) state for many years. Hindutva fanatics publicly advocate killing 200 million Muslims in India in order to establish a new Hindu state. The BJP has steadfastly pursued a policy to deny Muslims their rights, including outlawing Hindu-Muslim unions, erasing passages on democracy and secularism from school textbooks, and endorsing a propaganda film that compares Muslims to bloodthirsty traitors, not unlike Nazi productions like Jew Süss.
The lynchings and imprisonments that began this persecution of Muslims have been joined by what has come to be known as “bulldozer politics”—the rumbling of state-sponsored bulldozers in Muslim-majority neighbourhoods demolishing mosques, homes, and businesses. As hundreds of Muslim families watch from behind the barricades as their livelihoods dissolve into clouds of dust and debris, groups in saffron arrive to praise the demolitions and wave Hindutva flags.
In the last ten years, Islamophobia has dangerously increased in India. Over 200 million Muslims in the country live in terror due to frequent incidents of harassment, public beatings and mob assaults, property destruction, and lynchings.
“Is a Genocide Against Muslims Occurring in India?” was the subject of a report recently published by Georgetown University’s Bridge Initiative. Using Gregory Stanton’s 10 stages of genocide, the report analyses the position of Muslims in India.
The paper claims that India is currently in stage 8 of the genocide (persecution), with signs of stage 9 (extermination) becoming more obvious.
As their objectives depend on the subjection and dehumanisation of Indian Muslims, Islamophobia has been a major component of the BJP and the Hindu nationalist movement. In the last ten years, Islamophobia has dangerously increased in India. The nation’s 200+ million Muslims are living in fear due to the frequent incidents of harassment, public beatings and mob assaults, property destruction, and lynching. The election of PM Modi and his BJP is largely to blame for the surge in prejudice against Muslims.
Those in positions of authority continuously intensify their discourse of exclusion, prejudice, and hostility in an effort to keep Muslims and other non-Hindu minorities out of the civil and public spheres of the nation. As the government cracks down on free speech and political dissent, journalists and activists who draw attention to the hate speech and rising violence have been targeted by the authorities.
Through the spread of conspiracy theories portraying Muslims as a dangerous, pernicious threat to the Hindu community, Islamophobia has permeated all facets of Indian society. Indian Muslims must navigate a society where they are increasingly treated as second-class citizens, from laws that essentially criminalise interfaith marriages to bans on the hijab.
Right-wing Hindu activists and politicians from the BJP have launched public campaigns to demolish mosques, Muslim homes, and businesses, and law enforcement and the judiciary frequently support these actions. Anti-Muslim harassment, assaults, and killings occur frequently, but they are rarely investigated or prosecuted, leaving hate crimes unpunished.
In Modi’s India, where the Prime Minister has refused to denounce these voices or speak out against the escalating instability and social tensions, videos of BJP politicians and right-wing Hindu religious leaders encouraging Hindus to arm themselves and kill Muslims have become commonplace.
Three recognised experts in international law, including Sonja Biserko, Marzuki Darusman, and Stephen Rapp, made up a panel of independent foreign experts that released a report on significant human rights abuses committed against Muslims in India since 2019. The Panel concluded that there is credible evidence to demonstrate that the Indian government has violated a wide range of Muslim communities’ fundamental human rights. The evidence examined indicates that federal and state authorities “implemented a wide range of laws, policies, and behaviour that directly target Muslims or adversely harm them.”
The State failed to take the required steps to stop the crimes, conduct a thorough investigation, and bring the perpetrators to justice when they were committed by non-state actors. The Panel also discovered that several of the violations may be considered crimes against humanity, war crimes, or calls for the commission of genocide.
The Panel was created to examine the material that was available and decide whether there was enough reliable data to warrant a private, independent, and global study into the plight of Muslims in India. The Panel looked at reliable information sources, including articles from independent media, reports from civil society organisations, and studies from academic institutions.
The Panel discovered credible evidence that a number of human rights violations, including “arbitrary deprivation of life, arbitrary detentions, torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, gender-based violence and discrimination, incitement to discrimination, hostility and violence, discrimination in laws and policies are being committed against Muslims throughout India, but particularly in Assam, Delhi, Jammu and Kashmir, and Uttar Pradesh.
According to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, it was determined that the following events may qualify as crimes against humanity: “the crackdown on protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (December 2019–June 2020) in Uttar Pradesh” and “the repressive actions by the government against human rights defenders, journalists, and activists in Jammu and Kashmir following the change of its special autonomous status in August 2019.”
Finally, it was determined that a number of public speeches made between December 2019 and April 2022 in Delhi, Chattisgarh, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh by prominent political or religious leaders, calling on their audience to kill Muslims or rape Muslim women and girls, may constitute direct and public incitement to commit genocide. Some officials “made] explicit references to the eradication or removal or destruction of the religious community from the nation,” the Panel claims. The Panel stressed the need for an impartial entity to conduct additional research into such claims. In addition, quick action is needed to stop such occurrences from happening again.
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