By Jyoti Punwani / Deccan Herald
During a routine family gathering, I heard an uncle say it was time “we” stopped buying fruit from Muslim vendors. I must have been 12. It’s taken more than half a century for such advice, given behind closed doors among trusted family members, to be given publicly and even implemented in some states.
I grew up hearing gory accounts of Hindu girls buried alive in Sindh for marrying Muslims. Today, 11 states have enacted laws that criminalise such marriages.
How did this ideology, which wants 78 per cent of the population to regard 14 per cent as a threat, as enemies who must be punished for simply living everyday lives, become dominant, even official?
The feeling that Muslims had been relegated to second-class citizen status, a section that must live at the mercy of the Hindus — the goal of Hindutva — is not new. In every Hindu-Muslim riot, it comes through in the double standards of the police when dealing with the two communities. Judicial commissions have pointed it out, but no government has punished the police, who therefore see no need to change.
This story was originally published in deccanherald.com . Read the full story here