More than two weeks after the communal clashes, calls for boycotting Muslims are repeatedly being made both offline and online causing fear among the minority community.
Rohit Shukla | TwoCircles.net
MADHYA PRADESH — Several weeks after communal violence rocked the town of Khargone in Madhya Pradesh, a spate of messages and calls urging Hindus to socially and economically boycott Muslim businesses and establishments are being circulated over WhatsApp and other social media.
While Madhya Pradesh’s Muslim population is below 7 percent, Khargone town has almost 37 percent Muslims. Situated 125 kilometres south of Indore in Madhya Pradesh, the town—know for its cotton and chilli production—witnessed communal violence on April 10, after some locals allegedly hurled stones at a Ram Navami procession, and objected to provocative music being played in the Talab Chowk area of Khargone. Subsequently, clashes broke out in the Gaushala Marg, Tabadi Chowk, Sanjay Nagar and Motipura areas.
One person was killed and at least 24 injured in the violence. Ten houses were also reportedly burnt during the clashes. The following day, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ruled Madhya Pradesh government demolished homes and shops belonging to Muslims in Khargone. A senior police official claimed that the homes that were demolished belonged to those who had thrown stones during the procession.
More than two weeks after the communal clashes, calls for boycotting Muslims are repeatedly being made both offline and online causing fear among the minority community.
A video that went viral on Twitter showed a group of women taking an oath collectively to boycott purchases from any Muslim business establishment. The video evoked sharp responses from several quarters and was widely shared with a message asking the police to take action. “The video is reportedly from the Gayatri Mandir located in Ubdee village, about 14 km from the town of Khargone. The event was organised by the local Gayatri Parivar unit,” a youth from Khargone told TwoCircles.net on the condition of anonymity.
Locals from the town showed a WhatsApp status asking Hindus to boycott sending their children to the Aditya Vidya Vihar International School in Khargone, as the school heads at the institute are Muslim. The WhatsApp status also notes that the school has become a hub of the alleged ‘Love Jihad’ conspiracy.
TwoCircles.net also accessed a viral message being circulated on WhatsApp in the name of Bisa Neema Mahajan Sama’ of Khargone, a local merchant community organisation comprising mostly Hindus and Jains, asking everyone in the community to “not keep any kind of relations with Muslims.” The message talks about a big meeting of community organisations to be held for strengthening Hindutva once the curfew is lifted. The message urges everyone to make Muslims vacate all shops in not only Radha Vallabh Market but in the whole Khargone town.
In the immediate aftermath of the violence, Muslim shopkeepers who have rented shops in the Radhavallabh Market have allegedly been asked by the shop landlords to temporarily vacate the shops for a month or two.
A shopkeeper, on condition of anonymity, told TwoCircles.net that almost 8-10 shopkeepers including him had received calls asking them to vacate their shops just a day after the riots. “My owner said he was facing pressure from the community and I should vacate the shop till the situation cools down, probably for a month or two,” he said.
The shopkeeper revealed that most of the shops in Radha Vallabh Market belonged to the Neema Mahajan Samaj. “Three shops have vacated already and another shop is currently being vacated,” the shopkeeper said.
Another WhatsApp message locals of Khargone shared with TwoCircles.net purportedly tables a list of shops owned by Muslims. The message title notes, “Please stop buying things from these shops in Khargone.” The message also asks Hindu women to refrain from going to Jawahar & Birla Road. TwoCircles.net learnt that Jawahar and Biral Road hosts the Weekly Sunday market where street vendors sell homemade or local products. Most of these street vendors are Muslims belonging to nearby villages.
Another WhatsApp forward TwoCircles.net accessed laid out guidelines on identifying the owner of any business establishment. The message gives three pointer guidelines:
- Read the board of the shop.
- Search for the place of Diya Light.
- See the face of the owner and staff.
The message further says doing this will save your religion and culture and oneself for the next hundred years. Furthermore, it says, “You can’t throw stones but at least you can boycott.”
Some locals shared a recording of a phone call allegedly between the owner of a shop named ‘Baby Oil Mill’ and a local folk singer. The call is purportedly about a viral image circulated on WhatsApp, which shows several women in Hijab waiting to purchase groceries from the Baby Oil Mill shop, owned by a Hindu. The shop is close to Muslim populated localities of the Khargone. One can hear the folk singer saying that the image from the shop has gone viral in Khargone. In the recording, the local folk singer, who is also an activist, is asking the owner of Baby Oil Mill if he is selling products to Muslims, to which the owner responds that he was surprised at the sudden gathering of women to purchase things, and would not have otherwise sold it to them. The folk singer asks the owner “whether he will die if he sells his products a little less,” in a bid to pressure the shop owner to stop selling his goods to Muslim customers. The shop owner can be heard confirming that this was just happenstance and won’t happen again.
The local folk singer admitted to TwoCircles.net over phone that the “phone conversation (with the shop-owner) did happen.” He reasoned it by alleging that Muslims too have started an economic boycott against Hindus. “We will also do it (economic boycott) and be better than them,” he said.
This reporter also received a video from a local in which a loudspeaker stacked on a pickup truck can be heard asking Hindus to boycott purchasing any product from Muslim businesses. The video was also later shared on Twitter by The Quint journalist, Vishnukant Tiwari. A man’s voice can be heard asking the “Hindus to give a befitting reply for all the wrongdoing done to them in the riots and keep their shops closed in protest.” The announcement specifically calls for Hindu women to support the boycott. The video was shot in the village of Kateshwargaon in Maheshwar Block about 55 km away from the main town of Khargone.
#ViralVideo Alleged calls to boycott #Muslims plague #Khargone post #KhargoneRiot
"…Appeal to all Hindus to oppose them and mothers and sisters to not buy any item from them…"@TheQuint @QuintHindi pic.twitter.com/AbunVoPbfd
— Vishnukant (@vishnukant_7) April 26, 2022
In another video, the local BJP Member of Parliament (MP) from Khargone Gajendra Patel can be seen saying, “We have won in the name of religion. If you have thrown stones at us, then we are also followers of Satya Sanatan and we know how to respond with bricks against these stones.”
Local shopkeepers who were being asked to vacate their shops told TwoCircles.net that the owners of their shops also referred to pressure from the ‘Sansad’ or MP of the area.
ईंट का जवाब पत्थर से..!
_गजेंद्र पटेल,सांसद, खरगोन"हम धर्म के आधार पर जीते हैं अगर तुमने पत्थर बरसाए हैं तो ईंट का जवाब पत्थर से देने के लिए तैयार रहना है हमें..!"@TimesNow @ChouhanShivraj @OfficeOfKNath @digvijaya_28 @jitupatwari @MPArunYadav pic.twitter.com/CRTbaKunYd
— Govind ਗੋਵਿੰਦ گووند गोविंद गुर्जर (@govindtimes) April 26, 2022
Past communal flare-ups in Khargone
Khargone is not new to communal tensions and has seen previous bouts of flare-ups in the past, locals said.
In 2015, violence erupted in the town when people returning from celebrating the Hindu festival of Dussehra were reportedly stone-pelted. Following the violence, a curfew was imposed in the area for three days and nearly 70 people were arrested, per the Times of India report. According to locals, in 2016, a poster was put up on a mosque in town having pictures of freedom fighters along with Owaisi brothers with the caption ‘Jashn-E-Youm-E-Azadi Mubarak’ which incited stone pelting from right-wing Hindu organisations. The local police had registered an FIR against the people who put up the poster. The case is still pending in court.
TwoCircles.net tried to contact the Superintendent of Police (SP) & Collector Office of Khargone but on both occasions the office attendants said “the officers were busy or out of office.” According to a report in The Quint, an FIR has been registered on the basis of the video and the police are looking into other cases too. “We have taken suo motu cognisance and registered a case based on the viral video of the van calling for boycott under the IPC Section related to spreading enmity and ill will. Prima facie, it seems to have happened in the Katarwar area of the district. Based on that, an FIR has been lodged. Also, we are investigating the second video from the temple. More details will be revealed after the investigation,” The Quint quoted Rohit Kashwani, acting SP Khargone, MP, as saying.
Rohit Shukla is a freelance journalist based out of New Delhi. He tweets at @IRohit_Shukla