Afan Abdul Ansari dies and companion Nasir Hussain battles for his life after attack by cow vigilantes in Maharashtra.
As an american-born Indian (Hindu background), the Hindu nationalism truly saddens me.
There are many religions that are good until they get aggressive and radicalized, shinto-buddhism comes to mind, or Christianity and Judaism for that matter, and it’s a shame to see a religion meant to be based on peace and self-enlightenment turn into just another “I’m better than you because my parents were better than yours, ad infinitum!”
If you turn your sadness to curiousity and ask the question “who benefits?”, “who benefits from RSS-BJP’s Hindu supremacism?”, “who has been benefiting from 2014?” , your sadness will turn to anger.
The RSS-BJP is a Brahmin-Bania combine, they won’t do a thing without seeing personal benefit in it.
Yes, and the businesses exporting beef are owned mostly by upper-caste Hindus or Jains.
Just like Nazism, Hindu supremacism needed to create an enemy to polarize people and gain power doing “us v/s them:”. They created the enemy in Muslims. Jains, & upper-caste Hindus don’t eat meat. So the leaders of Hindu supremacy ran with the theme ‘Cow is our mother’ and directed the bloodlust & energy of the Hindu supremacist youth against anyone who eats beef, transports it, or is even accused of transporting it.
Since most of work in the meat industry is done by Muslims and Dalits, the violent and lucrative world of cow vigilantism aka gau(cow) raksha (rescue) has been formed. Since the cow clux clan enjoy political patronage and protection from the top leaders of the RSS & BJP (the Hindu supramacist pol. party that is in govenment), they rarely face any negative consequences. A few that did go to prison were welcomed and feted by top politicianson their release. Cow vigilantism is often a path to glory and an oppurtuniy to rise up the ranks.
Its also lucrative, because they extort money from terrified animal transporters.
