Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is under some heat for his inflammatory comments over the weekend that critics felt were anti-Muslim.
NEW DELHI — Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is under fire for campaign-trail comments blasted by critics as hate speech against Muslims, triggering anger and fear among the minority group.
On Sunday, just days after India kicked off a six-week election process in which Modi is seeking a rare third term, the 73-year-old leader addressed a rally in the northwestern state of Rajasthan.
Modi told the crowd that if Congress, the country’s largest opposition party, returns to power, it would distribute India’s wealth among “infiltrators”, incendiary remarks widely seen as intended to shore up support from his majority Hindu voter base.
“When they (Congress) were in power, they said Muslims have first right over the country’s wealth. They will take all your wealth and distribute it among those who have more children … among infiltrators,” Modi warned his audience. “Do you think your hard-earned money should be given to infiltrators? Would you accept this?” he added.
Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its supporters have previously referred to Muslims as infiltrators and criticized them for higher birthrates. Such comments have fanned fears among BJP supporters that Muslims would overtake the population of India’s majority Hindus. Muslims account for about 200 million of India’s 1.4 billion people.
New Delhi resident Guahar Raza, who is Muslim, said he was outraged by the comments.
“As a citizen of the country, I’m ashamed that the prime minister of the largest democracy has stooped so low,” said Raza. “He has threatened and insulted every citizen of this country. It’s not only the election that is at the stake, the country is at stake.”
India has endured violence and inter-religious conflict between Hindus and Muslims for years.
During his decade-long tenure, Modi has been attacked by critics for undermining India’s tradition of secularism. Since coming to power, he abolished the semi-autonomous status of the Muslim-majority state of Jammu and Kashmir. In January, Modi inaugurated the grand Lord Ram temple in northeastern Ayodhya on a site that was once a flashpoint of Hindu-Muslim conflict.
His government also rolled out a citizenship law that grants nationality to Hindus and people of some other faiths fleeing neighboring countries, a rule that critics felt was designed to keep out Muslims.
Hindu devotees converged in January on the newly inaugurated Lord Ram temple, which is built on a disputed site that was once a flashpoint of Hindu-Muslim conflict. © ReutersIndia’s opposition blasted Modi’s weekend comments as hate speech, and accused him of violating election rules that ban candidates from trying to sway voters on the grounds of religion, community or religious symbols.
Congress, which described the remarks as “deeply, deeply objectionable,” has called on the Election Commission of India to investigate. A commission official told India’s The Economic Times that the complaints were “under consideration.”
“In the history of India, no prime minister has lowered the dignity of his post as much as Modi,” Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge wrote on social media platform X.
Tom Vadakkan, the BJP’s national spokesperson, insisted that Congress had made an earlier pledge to redistribute wealth, and that Modi’s remarks were “taken out of context.”
Modi was “talking about illegal immigrants, not Muslims of the country,” Vadakkan told Nikkei. “Look at the U.S., Europe or for that matter any country, illegal immigrants are a huge issue.”
Modi and the BJP have repeatedly denied accusations of discrimination, saying the party works for the benefit of all Indian citizens.
But his comments on Sunday have left some Muslims wondering about their future.
In Meerut, a city bordering New Delhi that is set to go to polls this week under India’s multi-phase process, resident Zakir Tyagi said he wasn’t surprised by Modi’s language.
But “if the prime minister of the country is openly giving hate speech against Muslims during elections, one can only imagine what his average supporter thinks of Muslims living in his neighborhood,” Tyagi told Nikkei Asia.
Asaduddin Owaisi, a Muslim lawmaker and president of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen party, also took to social media to criticize Modi. “The only Modi guarantee has been to abuse Muslims and get votes.”
Meanwhile, civil society and rights groups have registered complaints with the election commission seeking Modi’s disqualification from the polls, which end in early June.
Some, however, doubt it will take any action against the popular leader.
“The election commission has shown no backbone,” said Raza, the New Delhi resident. “Even days after the comments were made, they hadn’t even uttered a word. This will affect the credibility of the elections.”
source : asia.nikkei