'Rip the children from the wombs of Muslim women': Muslims top targets of Hindutva hate violence
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The hate tracker, which monitors targeted attacks on Muslims, Christians and Dalits across India, recorded 87 incidents in July, a 15 per cent increase over the previous month, with the documented atrocities ranging from abusive, offensive and obscene remarks to public assaults, mob lynchings, threats and torture.
According to data compiled by Siasat.com, the cases identified by the tracker were those registered with the police and reported in the media, while the number of such incidents could go up as the number of unregistered crimes is likely to be higher.
Among the communities subjected to such crimes, Muslims continued to bear the brunt of the violence, with attacks extending beyond physical assaults to discrimination, inflammatory rhetoric and the demolition of religious structures.
The two documented incidents of partying on a boat on the River Ganga stood out for the discrimination shown by the authorities in taking action, as the five Hindu men who were arrested for consuming alcohol and non-vegetarian food aboard a boat were released on bail within days of their arrest, while 14 Muslim youths had to spend about three months in jail for a similar act earlier this year. The disparity reflected deepening institutional bias.
June also witnessed hate speech by Hindutva leaders, particularly in connection with the communal clash that erupted after the murder of a BJP leader in Dehradun, where some Hindutva leaders went as far as threatening to “rip the children from the wombs of Muslim women.”
Though the tracker recorded such incidents of threats and assaults, senior BJP leaders, including Union Minority Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju, played down the security threat faced by the Muslim community in the country, citing the constitutional rights granted to them and noting that highlighting Muslims' insecurity amounted to maligning the country.
The incidents from West Bengal, Bihar, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh attest that the violence against the Muslim community still persists, as a 71-year-old Trinamool Congress supporter, Shah Alam, was allegedly killed by BJP workers in West Bengal.
Bihar witnessed one of the month's most brutal crimes when 12-year-old Taufiq Khan was found murdered with severe head injuries, while Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan continued to witness demolitions and eviction drives targeting mosques, shrines and other religious structures over allegations of illegal construction.
UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath renewed his campaign against what he described as "love jihad" and "land jihad". At the same time, Telangana legislator T. Raja Singh faced legal action after making offensive remarks directed at Muslims before attempting to clarify that his comments referred only to Muslims outside India.
Dalits remained vulnerable to caste-based violence, with around a dozen cases documented, five of them fatal. Reports included a custodial death in Andhra Pradesh, the demolition of Dalit homes in Rajasthan, an honour killing linked to an inter-caste marriage, and several incidents of brutal assault and torture in Uttar Pradesh and Haryana. In one shocking case, a father stabbed his daughter inside a police station for marrying a Dalit man.
Although attacks on Christians declined sharply, the pattern of intimidation persisted. A tribal Christian family in Chhattisgarh was temporarily expelled from its village over allegations of religious conversion before being allowed to return after agreeing to embrace its former faith. In West Bengal, a Christian prayer meeting was attacked by members of the Vishva Hindu Parishad over unsubstantiated allegations of forced conversions.
The tracker also documented a striking incident in Uttar Pradesh where a Hindu youth was assaulted by a mob and forced to chant religious slogans and abuse Muslims. The episode, which drew widespread condemnation, underscored how coercive displays of majoritarian identity had become an increasingly disturbing feature of public life.