Prime Minister Narendra Modi while addressing a rally in Uttar Pradesh’s Bhadohi called out to his ‘Muslim sisters.’ He said, “I would like to tell the Muslim sisters of Bhadohi and across the nation, several countries don't have the provision for Triple Talaq. We want to give the same rights to our Muslim sisters which have been provided to the sisters in Muslim countries.”
The remark leads to a series of questions and demands for answers from our prime minister. On what basis are you asking ‘Muslim sisters’ to trust that you will defend them?
In the past five years with you as PM, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has demonised the Muslim community, unleashed verbal, physical and psychological violence on them, and normalised all of it. In fact, the BJP’s election campaigning in 2019 harps on communal hatred, to the extent that the only citizens rooting for Modi and BJP again are those who want a Hindu Rashtra.
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Why Don’t You Talk About Muslim Brothers?
Coming to the Triple Talaq Bill, many Muslim women rights groups have been advocating for it for decades. The BJP taking it up as their pet project points towards damage control – for the utter disregard and injustices meted out to the minority community under the Modi rule.
With the talk of Triple Talaq Bill and the attempt to win approval of Muslim women, it also looks to me like you are furthering the ‘saving’ Muslim women discourse, which conveniently fits your ‘Muslim men are bad, Muslim women are weak’ narrative.
And why do you never talk about what you have done for Muslim men, Mr Modi? Why does it feel like the Muslim sisters are just pawns in your scheme to attack Islam?
What About Wives Of Lynching Victims?
And Muslim sisters are not a homogenous community. Not everyone is thanking you for the Triple Talaq bill. There are many who are cursing you as you stood silent while their brothers, husbands and fathers were lynched by Hindutva goons, who call themselves ‘gau rakshaks.’
I doubt the mothers, wives and sisters of Mohammed Akhlaq, Junaid and Pehlu Khan, will fall for your ‘Muslim sisters’ tactic.
Nether will the mother and widow of Ramgarh lynching victim Alimuddin Ansari. They had to helplessly watch as your Union Minister Jayant Sinha garlanded the man that killed their son, husband. How will you as ask them for their votes?
Then there’s Fatima Nafees, whose son Najeeb disappeared the night he was beaten up by Sangh Parivar goons in JNU. She has been waiting for news about her son for almost three years now. Will you be able to talk to her about the rights of ‘Muslim sisters?’
You must also look back at your ‘Muslim sisters’ like Bilkis Bano, who were brutally gang-raped during the Gujarat riots and whose entire families were wiped out, those who have been waiting decades for justice. Why don’t you ever invoke them in your speech?
What About Your Silence on Hate Speeches?
When the BJP was campaigning in 2014, development and inclusiveness took over his campaign speeches. Many Muslims voted for the BJP, despite the fact that one of the biggest communal riots where Hindutva hardliners massacred over 3,000 Muslims happened in Gujarat while Modi was the chief minister.
He had been accused of aiding and abetting the riots. But Muslim sisters and brothers forgave, in hope of change, development, maybe some appeasement even.
But post 2014, things just went downhill. Beginning with the ghar wapsi that Indian Hindu organisations inflicted on Muslim community, to killing in the name of the cow, and BJP leaders openly calling for the killing of Muslims, your ‘Muslim sisters’ have been to hell and back, Modi ji.
The BJP’s Unnao MP Sakshi Maharaj called for razing Delhi’s Jama Masjid; Union Minister Giriraj Singh said Muslims must go to Pakistan; Maneka Gandhi recently even went to the extent of saying, she “will not be inclined to give jobs to Muslims if they don’t vote for her.” You remained silent through all of this and more. Weren’t your ministers talking of your ‘Muslim sisters’ then?
And let’s not forget that in 2017, you gave the reins of Uttar Pradesh to a bigot like Yogi Adityanath who once said, “If they (Muslims) kill one Hindu, we will kill a hundred.”
And now, the BJP has fielded Pragya Thakur, the woman who has been accused in the Malegaon blast and of systemically planning to attack Muslim-majority areas. The Muslims who vote for the BJP have always been let down, irrespective of their gender.
Don’t Modi and the BJP spot the glaring irony in blabbering about providing rights to Muslim women then? You will need a lot more than a promise of a single Triple Talaq Bill to make up for the Muslim hatred you have fanned in five years, Mr Modi, and to make your ‘Muslim sisters’ trust you.
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