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NEW DELHI, India — Tensions had been excessive Wednesday within the western Indian metropolis of Udaipur, a day after police arrested two Muslim males accused of slitting a Hindu tailor’s throat and posting a video of it on social media, in a brutal assault representing a dramatic escalation of communal violence in a rustic riven by deep spiritual polarization.
The killing comes after months of rising tensions between Hindus and Muslims, and has raised fears it can spark elevated violence.
Authorities suspended web companies within the metropolis and surrounding Rajasthan state in an try to forestall the grotesque video from being shared, whereas speeding extra police to Udaipur and banning massive gatherings in an try to forestall spiritual unrest from escalating. In New Delhi, a number of dozen individuals related to right-wing teams demonstrated towards the killing and demanded the culprits be hanged.
In latest months, there have been a spate of assaults by Hindu nationalists on minority teams — particularly Muslims — who’ve been focused for the whole lot from their meals and clothes type to interfaith marriages. Muslim houses have additionally been demolished utilizing bulldozers in some Indian states, in what critics name a rising sample of “bulldozer justice” towards the minority group.
The animosity worsened in Could when two spokespeople from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s get together made speculative remarks that had been seen as insulting Islam’s Prophet Muhammad and his spouse Aisha. Each had been later suspended by Modi’s get together.
The tailor who was slain on Tuesday, recognized as 48-year-old Kanhaiya Lal, had reportedly shared a social media submit supporting one of many spokespeople who had been suspended for the Prophet Muhammad remarks, based on native media.
The 2 males who had been arrested a number of hours after the assault, recognized as native Udaipur residents Gos Mohammad and Riyaz Akhtari, posted a second video of themselves within the aftermath of the killing, accusing Lal of blasphemy and threatening to kill Modi in the identical means, smiling as they sat on a sofa, brandishing lengthy blood-covered knives.
Within the video of the assault itself, one of many assailants could be seen being measured by the tailor, whereas the opposite one movies.
The person being measured then assaults Lal with a knife, stabbing at him because the tailor desperately tries to fend him off together with his arms. The person filming then apparently drops his cellphone and joins the assault, and Lal could be heard screaming for assist as he’s killed.
Police later mentioned the lads slit Lal’s throat, and tv experiences aired footage of the tailor’s bloody physique on the bottom.
Regardless of pleas from the police, each movies had been nonetheless circulating on social media platforms like Twitter and Fb a day later.
Consultants fear that the most recent incident might worsen India’s spiritual fault strains that critics say have deepened since Hindu-nationalist Modi got here to energy in 2014.
The divisions had been exacerbated by the remarks by his get together’s spokespeople concerning the Prophet Muhammad in Could, which additionally led to a extreme diplomatic backlash for Hindu-majority India from many Muslim-dominated international locations.
“This grotesque incident might result in escalated spiritual tensions throughout India, particularly with the ruling get together espousing a really strident Hindu majoritarian trigger,” mentioned Sushant Singh, a senior fellow on the Centre for Coverage Analysis, a public coverage assume tank.
“It’s unlikely that this authorities or management would exit of its solution to inform supporters to not get provoked, to induce for calm and peace,” he mentioned.
Assaults on individuals accused of alleged blasphemy are frequent in neighboring Muslim-majority international locations like Bangladesh and Pakistan. However in India, the place spiritual tensions usually boil over into sporadic riots and lethal protests, incidents of brutal killings of this nature are uncommon.
In Could, a Hindu man within the southern metropolis of Hyderabad was stabbed to loss of life in public by his Muslim spouse’s family. Final yr, a Muslim man was beheaded by members of a vigilante group on orders of his girlfriend’s Hindu household as a result of they did not approve of their interfaith marriage. In Rajasthan state in 2017, a Hindu man brutally killed a Muslim laborer and shared a video of the sufferer being hacked to loss of life after which set on hearth.
It was not clear whether or not the 2 alleged killers of the tailor had hyperlinks to any terrorist group, however India’s Dwelling Ministry has dispatched a workforce from its anti-terror company to Rajasthan to analyze. Up to now, the state police haven’t charged the 2 arrested males with terrorism.
Jamaat-e-Islami Hind, a key Muslim physique, condemned the killing in a press release and referred to as it “barbaric.”
“There isn’t a room for justification of violence in Islam,” it mentioned.
Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot promised a speedy investigation into Lal’s killing.
“I once more attraction to all to keep up peace,” Gehlot mentioned in a tweet.
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