New Delhi: A small town called Purola in Uttarakhand’s Uttarkashi district is in the grip of communal tension, with right-wing outfits in a stir over ‘land jihad’ and ‘love jihad’, and Muslim organisations agitating over the “atmosphere of hatred” and “forced exodus of community members”.
On Thursday, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal were gearing up for a mahapanchayat in Purola to discuss the “rising cases of love jihad”. However, the Uttarkashi district administration, after the state government’s intervention, denied permission for the mahapanchayat and issued prohibitory orders under Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, banning the assembly of four or more people.
Police put barricades on all roads leading to Purola even as hundreds of people assembled and submitted a memorandum to the district administration, demanding verification of minorities who settled in the state, and strict action against those “involved in love jihad”. They also threatened to start a major agitation if their demands aren’t met.
Many protested in Purola and other parts of Uttarkashi, decrying the denial of permission for the mahapanchayat. The VHP and Bajrang Dal called a ‘bandh’ (strike) due to which several shops stayed shut.
Bajrang Dal President Anuj Walia told reporters: “It is a big conspiracy against Hindus to stop mahapanchayat. We demand removal of the district magistrate who is acting on behalf of Muslim organisations.”
Meanwhile, Muslim outfits and religious leaders plan to hold a rally in Dehradun Sunday to highlight the “hatred” in the town.
Days ahead of the proposed Purola mahapanchayat, purported visuals of Muslims deserting their houses and shops in the town were viral on social media. Posters threatening shopkeepers from the community, asking them to leave Purola, also cropped up in various parts of the town.
Ankit Rawat, president of the Purola Pradhan Sangathan (an organisation of village heads), who along with the Purola Traders’ Association and right-wing outfit Devbhoomi Raksha Abhiyan gave the call for the mahapanchayat, had told ThePrint Wednesday: “We had a meeting with the local administration and they denied us permission to hold the rally over possible law and order issues.”
Soon after, however, he had said that the “local VHP and Bajrang Dal units have taken over charge of holding the rally, and we will participate in it to discuss various issues, including love jihad”.
Wasim Ahmad, media in-charge of the Muslim Seva Sangathan, the body planning the Sunday rally in Dehradun, told ThePrint that their “mahapanchayat will be organised under the leadership of the Dehradun Qazi (Muslim religious leader) to discuss the atmosphere of hatred in the state”.
He added: “It’s wrong to brand the entire community in a certain way and pressure is mounting on us to leave our businesses and houses in Purola. We have requested the Uttarakhand government to take action in cases of spreading hatred.”
The chain of events prompted an NGO to file a plea against the proposed Purola mahapanchayat for urgent hearing in the Supreme Court. A day before the event was supposed to be held, the court refused to entertain the petition, stating that law and order was the responsibility of the state government. It asked the petitioners to approach the high court.
On Tuesday, Jamiat Ulama-e-Hind president Mahmood Madani had written to Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, expressing concern over the tensions in Uttarkashi and “open threat of expulsion” to the Muslim community.
The same day, Dhami told the media that the “state government is not against anyone but will not allow Uttarakhand to become a soft target for love jihad, incidents of which have been on the rise over the last few months”.
“I have asked the director general of police to maintain peace in the state. We are conducting a verification drive on people coming to the state…We will not allow land in the state to be used for encroachment,” he further said.
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What sparked these tensions?
The tensions stem from a 26 May incident — two men, identified by the police as Jitendra Saini and Ubaid Khan, allegedly abducted a minor girl in Purola town, sparking allegations of ‘love jihad’.
Both were arrested under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act. Next day (29 May), right-wing groups held a big rally in the town, demanding that Muslims leave Purola. Videos of a mob purportedly attacking shops owned by Muslims went viral.
In a 5 June letter to the Tehri Garhwal administration, the VHP alleged that members of a particular community who mostly work as ice cream sellers or scrap dealers have become a threat to Hindu girls. The letter further said that Muslims have been given 10 days’ time to leave the town, or the VHP, alongwith the Hindu Yuva Vahini, will block the highway on 20 June in protest.
Meanwhile, a poster allegedly put up by an outfit called Devbhoomi Raksha Abhiyan warned “love jihadis” to vacate their shops by 15 June.
This was followed by local media reports that 42 Muslim shopkeepers had fled the town. Chairman of Pauri Municipal Corporation and former MLA Yashpal Benam reportedly had to call off his daughter’s marriage to a Muslim boy following protests by local VHP and Bajrang Dal members. Mohammd Zahid, Uttarkashi district president of the BJP’s minority cell, too shut his garment shop and fled Purola — where he resided for 25 years — on 6 June.
Days ahead of the proposed Purola mahapanchayat, Virendra Rawat, VHP’s working president in the town, told ThePrint that “there is no necessity of permission”.
“We have already sent letters to the district administration about the whole issue and the threat from a particular community in this district,” he added.
Echoing him, VHP spokesperson Vinod Bansal said that the “Hindu community is being forced to hold the mahapanchayat against jihadi elements in Uttarkashi, and the local unit of the VHP is supporting the community against jihadi elements”.
He added that the “Jamiat is wasting the time of the Supreme Court and home minister” and that “they should restrict their community to do love jihad and land jihad in Uttarakhand”.
CM Dhami on ‘love jihad, land jihad’
The phrases ‘love jihad’ and ‘land jihad’ have frequently been used by CM Dhami.
In December last year, the Uttarakhand assembly passed a bill to make the state’s anti-conversion law more stringent — it defined the religious conversion of two people or more people as ‘mass conversion’, and enhanced the punishment.
According to a new clause inserted in section 2 of the law, a ‘mass conversion’ refers to a case where the ‘religion of two or more persons is converted’, and ‘unlawful conversion’ means ;any conversion not in accordance with the law of the land’. The clause provides for jail of up to 10 years and a fine of up to Rs 50,000.
This unrest also comes at a time when the Ranjana Desai Committee — constituted to frame a Uniform Civil Code for Uttarakhand — is in the final stage of public hearings in Delhi before submitting its report to the government.
Dhami had first brought up ‘land jihad’, or ‘mazar jihad’, after becoming chief minister in 2021. That year, he had announced a survey of alleged illegal construction of mazars, or mausoleums, on forest land.
In April this year, Dhami said: “We are not against anyone but encroachment in the name of mazar will not be allowed. We will not allow land jihad to prosper. We believe in law but will not allow anyone’s appeasement.”
The forest department has reportedly demolished over 300 mazar on forest land.
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‘Religious polarisation to win LS polls’
The turmoil in Purola has prompted reactions from opposition parties. Uttarakhand Congress president Karan Mahara said the BJP was “creating religious polarisation in the name of love jihad to win the 2024 Lok Sabha polls”.
“Why is the state government silent on the hooliganism of the VHP? The country is run by the Constitution and not on the whims of certain organisations,” he told ThePrint.
“For the government, every section of society should be equal, but here, the state is itself creating an environment of hatred and allowing the VHP to instil fear among the Muslims. Why was the VHP silent over the Ankita Bhandari murder case in which the son of a BJP leader was an accused? You can’t differentiate among people in the name of religion,” he added.
BJP’s Uttarakhand president Mahendra Bhatt dismissed the Congress’s claim, and said the Congress wanted to change the demography of the state.
He told ThePrint: “It’s not a question of allowing hatred, but rather a sinister design to change the demography of Uttarakhand. Initially, mazars were constructed in the forest, but now such incidents are happening at many places. It is the duty of the government to maintain law and order.”
M. M. Semwal, a professor of political science at Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna Garhwal University, said religious polarisation has been gaining ground in Uttarakhand, like in other states.
“During the era of (former CMs) Bhagat Singh Koshyari and N.D Tiwari, the state’s politics revolved around personalities, but since Dhami is not a towering figure, he is forming his own Hindutva cult by allowing polarisation politics to secure his position in the BJP and in the state,” he told ThePrint.
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)
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