BJP lawmaker demands police screen couples for “love jihad” before marriage
In a draconian move to further criminalize interfaith marriage and infringe on the privacy of citizens, a lawmaker belonging to the Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from Madhya Pradesh state has called for police verification of couples one month before they get married.
BJP leader Narottam Mishra claimed that screening for “love jihad” should be mandatory before allowing couples to marry, rather than respecting the free will of private citizens.
Love jihad is a propaganda narrative circulated by Hindu extremists, claiming that Muslim men have an agenda to seduce Hindu women into marriage and then force them to accept Islam. However, successive probes have failed to find any evidence that such a conspiracy exists.
Madhya Pradesh’s government has already implemented a draconian anti-conversion law that makes it risky for Muslim men and Hindu women to be in any sort of relationship, whether platonic or romantic. Over the past year, several Muslim men have been attacked and arrested under false charges under anti-Muslim legislation.
Hindu supremacist mob vandalizes Christian prayer hall, no arrests made
Amid growing anti-Christian violence, a mob of over 100 Hindu supremacists vandalized a makeshift Christian prayer hall in Delhi last week over blatantly false allegations of forced conversion taking place inside the prayer hall.
A mob of over 100-200 Hindu supremacists broke into the hall during a Sunday mass and drove the congregants out, chanting the Hindu religious slogan “Jai Shree Ram” (Victory to Lord Ram), which is often used as a war cry by Hindu supremacists during violence and lynching.
Despite this clear instance of harassment and intimidation, no arrests have been made.
Under the anti-conversion law, Christian leaders say any Christian charity activity can be labeled by Hindu supremacists as “coercion carried out for conversion.”
According to data collected by United Christian Forum, a Christian human rights group, the number of violent incidents against Christians rose by nearly 75 percent after the anti-conversion law was enacted, up to 486 hate crimes in 2021 from 279 in 2020.
Kashmiri leader jailed under UAPA for donating charity, gets bail after 10 months
Kashmiri imam Javaid Ahmed Lone, who was arrested and imprisoned for 10 months under India’s draconian anti-terror law (the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act) under false charges, was granted bail by a court in Delhi after an extensive and unjust detention.
Among the ludicrous incriminating charges leveled against Lone are that he had promised a man financial help to build a house and donated 6 USD (INR 500) to another man to treat his daughter’s illness.
“Helping a person for building a house or providing financial help to a poor man for enabling him to take treatment for ailing daughter, cannot in any manner be considered to be incriminating,” read the bail order.
The federal probe agency that leveled the bogus charges against Lone also alleged that he was a member of the banned Muslim political group Jamaat-e-Islami Kashmir. The group was the largest politico-religious organization in Jammu and Kashmir before it was banned in 2019, after the BJP government stripped the region of its special autonomous status.
Since then, journalists, human rights defenders, and civilians have been subjected to interrogations, criminal investigations, arbitrary arrest, detention, and surveillance.
