Bareilly is Another Chapter
in Adityanath’s Sectarian Politics

The large scale arrests and punitive administrative actions like internet shut-down in Bareilly is a clear case of authoritarian over reaction on the part of the Uttar Pradesh Government targeting the Muslim community in the State. The combative police actions and public statements on the part of the Chief Minister and other officials are aimed at browbeating and harassing the minority community with specific political motives.

The disturbances in Bareilly started with the call for public protests by some Muslim groups against the incidents in Kanpur where the police had registered cases after some posters appeared in the town as part of the ‘I Love Muhammed’ campaign. The police registered cases as some Hindutva organizations described the posters as objectionable. As soon as the right-wing Hindutva outfits took objection, the police dutifully swung into an overdrive and took many Muslim youths into custody.

It was in this background that Muslim community leader Tauqeer Raza Khan, head of the Ittehad-e-Millath Council, called for protests which he later withdrew. Following some incidents of stone-pelting and other minor developments, the police arrested the Muslim community leader and many others and enforced disproportionate disciplinary actions. This show of strength against the members of the minority community was with the objective of pleasing the rightwing Hindutva forces, misusing the administrative system for scoring political gains. The Chief Minister’s statement that “some Maulaana forgot who was in power in the State” defending the police action exposes the real intent of the Chief Minister and the highly communalised administration in the State.

It is unfortunate that even the Opposition parties are not being allowed to make independent enquiries and come to the help of the affected people in Bareilly. On Saturday, the UP police stopped a delegation of Samajwadi Party led by the Opposition leader in UP Assembly, Mata Prasad Pandey, from visiting Bareilly on the grouds of the deteriorated law and order situation there. According to media reports, all the members of the Opposition delegation were either stopped from entering the town or were put under house arrest to prevent them from moving out.

This is an extreme act of highhandedness on the part of the BJP Government in Uttar Pradesh. The right to protest is part of a democratic system, and the UP Government is disregarding these rights and even arresting Opposition leaders in their authoritarian tendencies, denying even a semblance of justice to the members of the minority community in the State.

P Abdul Majeed Faizy
National General Secretary