Following this year’s general election in India, where the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party lost its majority in parliament, many commentators around the world celebrated what they saw as a revival of the “world’s largest democracy.” But this was wishful thinking; and it plays right into the BJP’s hands.
HONG KONG – Politically motivated bulldozing has returned with a vengeance in India. Earlier this month in the state of Madhya Pradesh, a local Muslim leader and member of the opposition Congress party watched his home, supposedly “illegally built,” reduced to rubble. A district official then gloated on social media that justice had been served for recent attacks on the police. Meanwhile, in the neighboring state of Uttar Pradesh, bulldozers flattened an “illegal” shopping complex, owned by a Muslim functionary of an opposition party who had recently been arrested on charges of gang-raping a minor girl.
HONG KONG – Politically motivated bulldozing has returned with a vengeance in India. Earlier this month in the state of Madhya Pradesh, a local Muslim leader and member of the opposition Congress party watched his home, supposedly “illegally built,” reduced to rubble. A district official then gloated on social media that justice had been served for recent attacks on the police. Meanwhile, in the neighboring state of Uttar Pradesh, bulldozers flattened an “illegal” shopping complex, owned by a Muslim functionary of an opposition party who had recently been arrested on charges of gang-raping a minor girl.