After a public uproar over the hate speeches against India's Muslims in the Hindu pilgrim town of Haridwar, and sharp questions raised by the country's Supreme Court,  the state police of Uttarakhand on Saturday arrested Yati Narsinghanand, a Hindu religious leader, the second such arrest in the past week. Narsinghanand is said to be a sect chief of a monastical order and one of the five Hindu radicals charged in the case

During a religious convention, called Dharm Sansad, held in Haridwar on December 17-19, some participants had called for mass violence against Muslims, open instigation to arms while one of the speakers said he wished to shoot former prime minister Manmohan Singh for his defence of minorities.

This was the second arrest in the case after public shock, and even international condemnation, as videos of the event were widely circulated on social media and the Supreme Court sought a response from the state government on what it had done about the speeches as these were in open contravention of the law. 

A large group of 76 Supreme Court lawyers had urged Chief Justice of India N.V Ramana to take "suo motu" cognisance of the Haridwar event and direct that action be taken against the guilty persons under various Indian laws. 

Finally, on January 13, Uttarakhand Police arrested Jitendra Narayan Tyagi, the former Uttar Pradesh Shia Waqf Board chairman who until last month went by the name Waseem Rizvi, and was said to have converted to Hinduism from Islam. 

At a US Congressional Briefing in Washington on January 12, organised by the Indian American Muslim Council, Gregory Stanton, founder Genocide Watch, had called for the enforcement of the law in India as "incitement of genocide is a crime under the genocide convention". 

"That law must be enforced. There are also other laws in India that can be enforced against the leaders of this…and yet Mr.Modi has not said a word against this. He has not spoken out against that violence," Stanton said. 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and leaders of his government and the ruling BJP, have been criticised for remaining silent over the open call for "genocide against Muslims", while some regional leaders have been mealy-mouthed over the issue. 

"At a recent conclave in Haridwar, we saw the spectacle of what lies ahead—speeches spewing venom and openly calling for genocide. Ironically, for lesser deeds, often trenchant criticism of the regime in Uttar Pradesh has attracted sedition" and other draconian laws, opposition Congress party leader Kapil Sibal wrote in an op-ed in the New Indian Express.   

"For what transpired in Haridwar, spreading communal hatred, to say the least under police watch, is clearly made out. Yet no arrest," Sibal regretted in his article last week. 

Many political analysts associate such inflammatory speeches with the BJP's political strategy of polarising the electorate on religious lines ahead of crucial state elections next month in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Goa and Manipur. Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has been quoted as saying that the balloting would be on 80:20 lines in the state, an allusion to the population divide between the majority Hindus and minority Muslims. 

(SAM)