Days after the brutal murder of a Hindu tailor Kanhaiya Lal in Udaipur by two Islamists, the American news magazine Time sought to downplay the severity of the heinous crime.
In an article published on Friday (July 1), Time reporter Sanya Mansoor used the gruesome killing to peddle the narrative of ‘Muslim victimhood’ and trivialise the security and safety concerns of the Hindu community in India.
At the very onset, Mansoor shifted the discourse from the beheading of Kanhaiya Lal to supposed ‘chilling calls for revenge’ against the ‘marginalised’ Muslim population.
While trying to contextualise the murder of Kanhaiya Lal, Sanya Mansoor suggested that the poor Hindu tailor had drawn the wrath of the Islamists upon himself by supporting the ‘derogatory comments’ of ex-BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma.
Meanwhile, Mansoor also tried to shield the co-religionists of the killers and praise them for their token condemnations. “Muslim politicians and Islamic preachers swiftly condemned the killing,” she asserted while conveniently ignoring their collective silence over calls of ‘Sarr tan se juda chants all over India backed by the same people.
The bewilderment of the Hindu majority
Hindus in India are caught in a state of dilemma. They can neither demand protection from the State as they happen to be the ‘non-violent majority’ nor can they defend themselves out of the fear of being called brute majoritarians, oblivious to minority rights.
As such, the cornered Hindus are busy running hashtags on social media, hoping to wake up the State from its deep slumber. In recent years, the community has been able to garner support globally and raise awareness in the virtual world for their plight.
However, Islamists and their sympathisers in the media want to snatch away even this last remaining recourse from the Hindus to voice their concerns. Such an attempt was made by Sanya Mansoor in her vicious article in Time. This became evident when she went on an unhinged tirade against the social media hashtag ‘Hindu Lives Matter.’
She claimed, “Political experts call that dangerous, risking the amplification of a heinous but isolated crime into an assertion of systemic violence against Hindus, who make up some 80% of India’s 1.2 billion people.”
The murder of Kanhaiya Lal is not an isolated incident
It must be recalled that the murder of Kanhaiya Lal by Islamists, namely, Riyaz Attari and Mohammad Ghaus, is not an isolated incident. 7 days prior to his beheading, another Hindu man named Umesh Kolhe was hacked to death for supporting Nupur Sharma.
Several people, including TV actresses, have received death threats for merely speaking in support of the ex-BJP spokesperson. In the days leading up to the brutal murders, Islamists ransacked public property, set vehicles on fire and brought life to a standstill in several cities across India.
The common Hindu, unaware of his sense of religious identity, watched in silence while the Islamists created mayhem on the streets. Their unabashed display of street power, coupled with the silence of their ‘moderate’ co-religionists, have struck terror in the heart of an average Hindu.
It must not be forgotten that there was a Kishan before Kanhaiya and a Kamlesh before Kishan. All of whom were slaughtered on allegations of blasphemy.
Islamist crimes are always backed by perfect excuses
This has however made way for aspersions that blasphemy, which is a part of public discourse in civilised, secular societies, is somehow to blame for their brutal murders.
Such a vicious argument that tends to rationalise the idea of snatching away a human life even found affirmation in the highest echelons of the Indian judiciary.
Even in the absence of blasphemy, there were attacks on Hindu religious processions as evident from Ram Navami and Hanuman Jayanti celebrations. While Islamist sympathisers tend to blame the communal violence on the BJP, a thorough reading of history since the 1980s suggests otherwise.
One of the admirable qualities of these extremist elements is that they have an abundance of excuses to justify their heinous crimes. And despite being the aggressors, they are well-equipped to pose as the perpetual victim.
Nupur Sharma and blasphemy is just an eyewash. Islamists are baying for the blood of the non-violent majority, who are left to fend for themselves, with no intellectual ecosystem to back them up.
The assertion of systemic violence against Hindus is real and vivid, which only remains invisible to the eyes of bigots who are blinded by Hindu hatred.
Political ‘journalist’ begs to not generalise all Muslims over ‘isolated cases’
Mansoor sought the comments of one Dhirendra Jha, who has been described as a political journalist and the author of the propaganda book ‘Shadow Armies: Fringe Organizations and Foot Soldiers of Hindutva.’
Jha remarked, “Just because two members of that community commit this type of crime you cannot paint the entire community with the same brush
Profile of Dhirendra Jha. This is not good for Indian democracy.”
As evident from the above discussion, the murder of Kanhaiya Lal is not an isolated one. Several Hindus have paid the price of such whitewashing of Islamist crimes with their lives, only to be told that their death should not be used to generalise the Muslim community
Jha happens to be a politburo member of the Communist Party (Marxist and Lenin), which partly explains his attempts to distance religious angle from the gruesome killing of the Hindu tailor.
बर्मा विस्थापितों को सरकार द्वारा दी गयी कानूनी जमीन को समस्तीपुर के खानपुर के सीओ ने घूस लेकर भूस्वामियों के नाम कर दिया है। @cpimlliberation डटकर उनके पक्ष में खड़ा है। माले नेता प्रेमानंद महतो जो विस्थापितों के नेता हैं,के भतीजा को कल गोली मारी गयी! pic.twitter.com/gqSNJrTJp2
— Dhirendra Jha (@dhirendra_ml) July 2, 2022
However in his propaganda book, Jha left no stone unturned to insinuate that crimes by fringe elements are in fact the manifestation of ‘right-wing Hindutva, fascist politics’ under the Narendra Modi regime.
Youngsters at Academy for Marxist Studies (previously Anil Marxist Sangam) took to reading books on Fascism and summarising them for easy consumption. As a first they have done it for Dhirendra Jha’s “Shadow Armies”. Sharing both English and Tamil summaries in this thread pic.twitter.com/YOsB1Q4w9o
— Mathur Sathya J (@MatSatJ) June 30, 2022
Jha, a contributing writer at the leftist propaganda news portal The Caravan, had earlier mocked India’s largest tax reform at the expense of the Hindu community. He had claimed that there would be a cow tax, temple tax and a Hindu festival, tax after the implementation of the Goods & Services Tax (GST).
His insensitive comments on the Kanhaiya Lal murder should not come as a surprise, given his past track record of doing whataboutery and peddling Muslim victimhood.
Leftist apologist peddles delusional theories interlinking Hindutva with white supremacy
Time reporter Sanya Mansoor also sought refuge in the ‘political expertise’ of a New Zealand-based Professor, Mohan J Dutta. Described as an ‘anti-Muslim hate’ researcher, Mohan outrightly dismissed claims of systematic oppression.
“It’s ironic that a majoritarian structure takes that hashtag to deploy hate towards India’s Muslim minority community, which has consistently been targeted by hate,” he made outlandish assertions about #HinduLivesMatter.
The Professor suggested that the hashtag, meant to describe and uphold the value of Hindu lives, is somehow related to calls for ‘Muslim genocide.’ His past record sheds light on his diatribe against the amplification of Hindu voices, silenced by Islamists.
Stop Hindu Hate Advocacy Network (SHHAN) had pointed out how Mohan J Dutta had published a propaganda-laden whitepaper, wherein he alleged that Chinmaya Mission NZ and Vishwa Hindu Parishad are terrorist organisations.
When asked to provide evidence to back his claims, he resorted to name-calling and censoring Hindu voices. “Along with accusing Hindus of being Islamophobic, Dutta has time and again equated Hindutva with white supremacy,” stated SHHAN.
Mohan has been open about his political affiliations and had urged the people of West Bengal to vote for the Communist Party of India (Marxist).
“As you go in to vote in Bengal, consider what would it take to dismantle the fascist politics of the BJP. #VoteLeft as Left is the only ideological ground for fighting fascists,” he had tweeted.
#LokSabhaPolls #bengalpolls as you go in to vote in Bengal, consider what would it take to dismantle the fascist politics of the BJP. #VoteLeft as Left is the only ideological ground for fighting fascists. My OpEd. https://t.co/mFdWHdQeBO
— Mohan J Dutta (@mjdutt) May 18, 2019
Mohan J Dutta was also one of the speakers during an anti-Hindu event titled, ‘India on the Brink’ wherein aspersions were cast about an impending Muslim genocide.
Scholar justifies the murder of Kanhaiya Lal as a reaction to Hindu vigilante groups
Angana Chatterji, described as a scholar by Time reporter Sanya Mansoor, had no qualms about contextualising the beheading of Kanhaiya Lal. She hinted that his killing was somehow the outcome of a reactionary force from the Muslims, who are ‘oppressed’ by the Hindu community.
“Systemic violence by state institutions and Hindu vigilante groups against Muslims are bound to commence cycles of violence,” Chatterji had justified.
She then went on to assert that the lives of victims of the Islamist onslaught in India had not been overlooked in a ‘Hindu-majority country.’ The ‘scholar’ from the University of California remarked, “This is a revisionist fabrication of history and the present.”
“She supports “freedom” for Kashmir and has fabricated many reports, some in connivance with international human rights agencies, accusing Indian government and Indian army of sexual violence on Kashmiri women,” states Stop Hindu Hate Advocacy Network (SHHAN).
Angana Chatterji has been associated with the Jamat-e-Islami-linked Indian American Muslim Council since 2003. According to journalist Vijay Patel, she has actively lobbied against the visa of Narendra Modi in the United States.
8. In 2005 Angana Chatterji and IAMC established another shell organisation ‘Coalition Against Genocide’ (CAG) and claimed that this organisation is a separate entity with the support of 40 different organisations.
— Vijay Patel🇮🇳 (@vijaygajera) May 10, 2022
This CAG has lobbied against the Visa of Narendra Modi in the USA pic.twitter.com/S2RM58ujnf
“In 2011 Angana Chatterji and her husband Richard Shapiro were suspended and later dismissed from California Institute of Integral Studies after students complained against them. They were found guilty of “failure to perform academic duties and violation of professional ethics. Angana Chatterji was also accused of harassing students”, informed SHHAN.
“She calls Indian history ‘nationalistic and mythic’, proclaims the now-debunked Aryan Invasion Theory as correct history, supports history that says Hinduism was created by Aryans from Central Asia and accuses Hindus of subjugating Adivasis and indigenous people,” it added.
Her name cropped up, following the arrest of Pakistani ISI-operative Ghulam Nabi Fai by FBI officials. According to Sandeep Balkrishna, Chatterji was codenamed ‘Mary’ to meet the then ISI’s Security Directorate Major General, Mumtaz Ahmad Bajwa.
Dangerous revelations from the FBI’s arrest of Ghulam Nabi Fai is that Angana Chatterji was codenamed “Mary,” showing extent to which the enemy had cultivated Indians willingly volunteering to backstab India.#BloodyAcidic https://t.co/hAHOWya257 via @dharmadispatch
— Ratan Sharda 🇮🇳 रतन शारदा (@RatanSharda55) October 28, 2019
Throughout her article, Time reporter Sanya Mansoor used a brutal episode of Islamist terror to build a case against the Hindu community. She pontificated that Hindus by way of their speech and actions have ‘rightfully’ drawn the wrath of Islamists.
This becomes clear from the choice of her ‘political experts’, who reiterate the same talking points and trivialise the beheading of Kanhaiya Lal in one way or the other.
Kanhaiya Lal is not the last victim of terror, perpetuated by Islamists in India. Given the circumstances, Hindus must not give up on their social media activism.
Propaganda pieces in international publications must not bog us down. Social media is our last recourse for justice in a world of mute spectators and deaf ears.
