By Alishan Jafri and Vipul Kumar
Eleven-year-old Raman has a life plan in place – he will get married when he turns 12 next year and to sustain his family, he will “become Lawrence Bishnoi.”
Raman (name changed) is the cousin of Vipul Kumar, one of the two authors of the piece. Raman’s father, a skilled migrant worker, moved the family to Gujarat from their native village in Bihar a year ago. The move left Raman without friends. His phone was his only source of entertainment and Bishnoi, his new hero. What did Raman know about Bishnoi?
“Lawrence wanted to kill a fox as a child, but Salman Khan stopped him, so now he wants to kill Salman,” Raman said, unfaltering in confidence.
Though wildly inaccurate, his fascination with Bishnoi was steady. Bishnoi is in jail in Gujarat but has now found renewed space in front pages since he was named by the Canadian government as someone whose gang was allegedly working with the Indian government to foment violence in Canada. Then there are his multiple threats to the actor Salman Khan. Through all of this, Bishnoi has become a hero to young men and children, primarily thanks to social media.
Bishnoi himself does not have a personal social media account. His name has been banned from yielding search results on Meta. And yet, videos on him, posted by fawning social media participants, go viral all the time. As per the National Investigation Agency and various state police forces, content featuring Lawrence Bishnoi’s name alone has an impact on youngsters. Certain groups attempt to sell illegal firearms in his name, while others sell anything that passes for “Lawrence Bishnoi merchandise”.
Recently, The Wire reported on e-shopping platforms and websites like Meesho selling the latter. It caught the attention of other news platforms and caused massive online uproar. Soon, these platforms took down their products.
This story was originally published in thewire.in. Read the full story here.
