A group of Muslim students in the Indian capital New Delhi were beaten up for not chanting the nationalist slogan ‘Jai Mata Ki’, India Today reported.
The victim, Mohammad Dilkash, along with friends from the seminary, Ajmal and Naeem, were walking through a park in New Delhi’s Begumpur area last week when they were assaulted.
“We had gone to a park nearby. Some men came and slapped one of my friends and asked him to say ‘Jai Mata Ki’, they said they would kill us if we did not say it. But we did not,” Dilkash was quoted as saying.
“We were not even given a chance to say anything. We then called up our teacher who came and then called up the police,” the other victim Ajmal added.
Extremist elements in India have been opposed to improvement in relations with Pakistan.
On October 13, 2015, between 10 and 15 Shiv Sena activists attacked with ink, Sudheendra Kulkarni, organiser of former Pakistani foreign minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri’s book launch, hours before the event.
The group was also accused of using threats to force the cancellation of an appearance in Mumbai by Pakistani singer Ghulam Ali.
Activists of India’s far-right political group Shiv Sena attacked the Mumbai headquarters of the office Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on October 19, just before Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Shaharyar Khan was to meet BCCI chief Shashank Manohar to discuss a bilateral series in December.
Sena activists crashed through the gates of the office in Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium that serves as the headquarters of the BCCI.
While in September last year, a 50 year old Muslim man Mohammad Akhlaq was dragged from his house in Dadri, a small town in the outskirts of Indian capital New Delhi, and beaten to death by around 100 people over suspicions he had eaten or stored beef.
The incident occurred soon after a nearby temple made an announcement via loudspeaker that the family had consumed beef.
Protesting against such incidents, at least 42 novelists, essayists, playwrights and poets had returned the awards they received from Indian government with the last one being Arundhati Roy.
