BJP lawmaker mocks Muslim call to prayer, makes blasphemous comments
A lawmaker from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) publicly mocked the Muslim call to prayer, asking during a speech whether Allah “was deaf” if Muslims had to recite his name through the microphone every day.
Former minister of Karnataka state and Hindu supremacist leader K. S. Eshwarappa was giving a speech when the Muslim call to prayer was heard from a nearby mosque, as has been the norm in India for centuries.
However, Eshwarappa immediately responded with hateful anti-Muslim comments, saying the call to prayer was a “headache” for him wherever he went.
“Today or tomorrow, this (practice of calling to prayer over mics) will definitely end,” Eshwarappa said.
“Allah could only hear if you scream on the microphone?” he continued. “But if they have to scream loudly through the mic, then we have to say [Allah] is deaf. There is no need (for azaan).”
The minister has previously grabbed headlines for his anti-Muslim and hateful statements. During Karnataka state’s campaign to ban the hijab in schools, Eshwarappa – who was then a minister – said the Hindu saffron flag would replace India’s current flag, which symbolizes pluralism, in the coming years.
Hindu supremacists throughout India have begun campaigns to erase Muslim religious expression from India, including by banning loudspeakers in mosques while allowing Hindu supremacists to parade with loudspeakers and blast genocidal songs.
Muslim food delivery worker assaulted, publicly humiliated by Hindu extremists
A Muslim student working as a food delivery worker was brutally assaulted and abused by a Hindu extremist mob during the Hindu religious festival, Holi.
Video footage shows the victim, Amran, delivering the ordered food items when four Hindu extremists start attacking him using sticks. While on their way back after the assault, they pelt stones and bricks at Amran.
“One of them even picks up a wooden log and hit me,” said Amran, who is working in food delivery to help pay for his education.
In an attempt to humiliate Amran and publicly strip him of his Muslim identity, one of the Hindu extremists forcefully smeared colors on Amran’s beard and put a tilak (Hindu religious symbol) on his forehead.
Amran said that the Hindu extremists were triggered by a Muslim man entering their locality and began shouting “throw him out.”
He reported that it was only after the video was widely shared on social media that the police detained four people for participating in the attack.
Hindu supremacists call for economic boycott of Muslims in hate speech rally
Hindu supremacists called for an economic boycott of Muslims during an anti-Muslim hate speech rally organized by Hindu supremacist groups in Maharashtra state. The rally was attended by leaders of the Hindu supremacist BJP, as well as members of Hindu militant groups Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal.
Besides calling for a boycott, Hindu supremacist speakers at the rally also made baseless claims that Muslims were propogating “love jihad” and “land jihad”.
“Love jihad” is a conspiracy theory peddled by Hindu supremacist groups that claim that there is a plot by Muslim men to seduce Hindu women in order to convert them to Islam. Similarly, “land jihad” falsely accuses Muslims of waging a campaign to encroach on public land and property owned by Hindus.
The rally is among the many similar ones that have been held across Maharashtra since November last year. In nearly all of them, Hindu supremacists have called for violence against Muslims or floated conspiracy theories about the community.
