New Delhi: Hindutva activists of a group called Sri Ram Sene vandalised stalls owned by Muslims in Karnataka’s Dharwad on Saturday, destroying fresh fruits and vegetables on carts.
Deccan Herald has reported that the latest incident of anti-Muslim violence took place on the Nuggikeri Anjaneya Temple premises.
Journalist Harish Upadhya has tweeted videos from the ground, showing watermelons lying on the street.
Muslim push cart vendors targeted outside Hanuman Temple in Dharwad. Sri Ram Sene members vandalize & destroy watermelon & other fruits.Ram Sene says #Muslim vendors shouldn't do business outside temples. Cops present at the location did nothing to stop the vandalism #Karnataka pic.twitter.com/gu0pCjt0lj
— Harish Upadhya (@harishupadhya) April 9, 2022
Upadhyay has tweeted that police at the site did not stop the miscreants and has posted a video which he has transcribed. In it, a Hindutva activist, identified by a saffron scarf, is heard telling a policeman that they had given the Muslim sellers an “ultimatum”. The policeman says that they could have intimated police.
What was the state doing? How brazen are these goons? Watch this video.
Sene guy: We had given them an ultimatum to remove, they didn't even after 2 weeks. All these belong to Muslims
Cop: You should have given us an intimation
Sene guy: We have intimated everyone pic.twitter.com/AAVyUsTUEW— Harish Upadhya (@harishupadhya) April 9, 2022
Deccan Herald has reported that the Sene had, in fact, issued a “deadline” for the body managing the temple to evict the Muslim sellers 15 days ago.
Saturday’s action was thus the culmination of a threat. Muslim fruit sellers who spoke to Deccan Herald told the paper that in the last 15 years, they had never been asked to vacate the premises.
A member of the temple’s management body has said that 99% of those who had stalls in the temple were Hindus and that such slots were usually given to poor people.
The Dharwad Hindutva group’s actions come days after another Hindutva leader, Chandru Moger, coordinator of the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti in Bengaluru, urged Hindus to only purchase fruits from Hindu vendors to “help end the monopoly of Muslims in the fruit business”.
There is renewed call for this kind of economic boycott of Muslims on the back of Hindutva groups seeking bans on halal meat and the use of loudspeakers in mosques during azan.
This article first appeared on thewire.in
