After mobs were allowed to take over parts of Delhi, how to keep hope alive is the question

“Delhi mey ab halaat kaisey hain”, my friend Abdullah asked frantically from Gorakhpur. Soon afterwards Anwar Bhai called up from Allahabad with a similar query. My own driver Saleem, living in the Okhla area of Delhi, pestered me with a dozen questions about Maujpura riots. At last he heaved a sigh and said: “hallaat to bahot kharab hain bus Allah rahem karey.”

Maujpura riots once again left Indian Muslims with a million questions, all reflecting growing sense of insecurity. All hopes aroused post-Shaheen Bagh anti-CAA and NPR/NRC protests began to fade with horrifying videos depicting scenes of Muslim shops and even some houses being burnt in North-East Delhi while Delhi Police looked the other way.

Shaheen Bagh had come as a big relief to Indian Muslims in times of Hindutva politics. It was for the first time since Narendra Modi came to power in 2914 that Hindus and Muslims stood together in the defence of Indian Constitution and Indian secular values.

Shaheen Bagh soon became a phenomenon which was replicated across the country, where the Indian pluralistic ethos prevailed over the hard anti-Muslim rhetoric of the BJP. It not just kindled hope within the Muslim minority but it also gave them a sense of belonging and security.

“It was liberating for the Muslims to feel secure when Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Dalits and members of various other communities, youth, women and students, academics and artistes stood shoulder to shoulder with Muslims for their cause,” points out Imtiaz Ahmed, a Muslim scholar.

But three days of rioting in North-East Delhi shattered all those hopes of security, brotherhood and a new beginning of Hindu-Muslim unity. The question haunting virtually every Muslim mind now is: what now; is there another Gujarat type massacre on the cards?

No one has any clue about this disturbing query. But everyone within the community is apprehensive about something serious cooking somewhere against the Muslims. “If Maujpura kind of riots can take place in the national capital when the US President was in town, much worse could happen in a state like Uttar Pradesh whose Chief Minister has a history of being anti-Muslim”, feels a young professional Muzaffar Abbas.

Maujpura has pushed Indian Muslims to the edge. The community has been nursing insecurity for decades now. A series of horrifying communal riots beginning with the demolition of Babri mosque in 1992 leading up to Gujarat massacre bred tremendous insecurity among Indian Muslims. But off and on, electoral setbacks to the BJP, both at the national level, for instance in 2004 in the parliamentary election and various states like in UP in 1993, kept the community’s hope in democracy and the Indian state alive.

It also worked as a safety valve against the Muslims turning to extremism like in other Muslim countries although the rise of Modi, along with public lynching of the minority community members, has horrified Indian Muslims.

Then followed the Citizenship Amendment Act with the threat of NRC. “You demolished the Babri mosque but we kept quiet; you amended the Muslim Personal Law but we maintained our calm; you organised massacres like Gujarat but we did nothing. Now you want to snatch our citizenship and convert us into second class Indians with no rights. How long can we sit quietly watching our own destruction without even lifting a finger against you,” asks Rashid Siddiqui, a young lawyer.

This loss of hope after CAA/NRC pushed the horrified community to streets like Shaheen Bagh, where thousands of Indian citizens of all hues and faiths joined Muslims in solidarity. It came as a ray of hope to the community which was now feeling not just insecure but was facing an existential crisis after the CAA/NRC blow.

Shaheen Bagh came as a whiff of refreshing change for the besieged community. It provided a sense of togetherness to the Muslims with fellow Indians, giving them the much needed sense of not being alone. It gave Muslim women a new sense of liberation because they came out in large numbers at the vanguard of a key movement in the community’s life.

The anti-CAA/NRC movement also provided a much needed opportunity for the Muslim masses to tear themselves away from the clutches of conservative Muslim clergy which for long had called the shots and held the community hostage.

But Maujpura has dashed all hope that Shaheen Bagh might have kindled. The community is once again haunted with not just a sense of insecurity but also a sense of hopelessness which is dangerous.

“The community tried its democratic option in elections but we failed to oust the hardliners out of power. We took to streets to defend our right to Indian citizenship. But riots overtook us on the streets. Where do we go now from here,” asks young Ayesha, a Jamia student.

It is this sense of hopelessness after Maujpura riots that is looming large over the Indian Muslims and it is dangerous for both the community and the country.