Muslim family brutally beaten by ‘Cow vigilantes’ in Madhya Pradesh

NEW DELHI: A video emerged on social media showing an Indian Muslim man being thrashed and his mother’s clothes being torn up in Chhindwara, Madhya Pradesh.

The news, though a week old broke on twitter late on Tuesday evening, September 20.

The event that purportedly occurred seven days earlier was mentioned in the tweet. It claimed that Wajid Ali, a resident of Lalgaon village in the Chhindwara district of Madhya Pradesh, and his family were attacked by a crowd. The police’s slow response time was highlighted.

MP: Wajid Ali, a resident of Lalgaon village in Chhindwara, was traveling with his parents on September 15, when a mob stopped him near Auria village.Ali was allegedly tied to a bike and dragged amidst religious slogans.Mother’s clothes were torn and father was beaten up pic.twitter.com/ZAKovwpfPZ

— The National Bulletin (@TheNationalBul1) September 20, 2022

As per reports, the local police are said to have taken little to no action following a mob attack on Wajid Ali, a native of Lalgaon village in Madhya Pradesh’s Chhindwara district, and his family seven days ago.

A purportedly Hindu mob stopped this Muslim family as they were travelling with his parents, assaulted the entire group, pulled the man after tying him to the bike, and tore his mother’s clothing and the father was beaten.

The incident reportedly occurred on September 15.

According to reports, the assault went on for an hour before police intervened, said Ali. Ali claimed in a video clip that the family was beaten and abused because of their religious beliefs.

Police have lodged FIR against unknown.

“Our statements were deliberately changed by cops as accused & TI belong to the same caste.” Wajid Ali said.

On September 17, victims went to SP Chhindwara after observing no action taken against the attackers. The victims are still waiting for justice, for arrests to be made, and for investigations to start despite having complained for hours on end.

Only four months prior, in May 2022, Sabrangindia published an article detailing the gruesome murders of two Adivasi (tribal) males in Madhya Pradesh at the hands of cow vigilantes. The 20-man criminal gang reportedly broke into a tribal family’s home at that time and beat two men to death and injured another.

Street mobs in India have been operating with impunity in recent years. A lynching was reportedly committed in Tripura’s Sepahijala area in March. A 26-year-old Muslim guy was the victim; he was lynched by a crowd who thought he was “a cow thief.”

Litan Miah, a resident of Tarapukur in the vicinity of the Jatrapur police station in the Sonamura subdivision, was named as the victim. Following a police complaint from the victim’s father Jamal Miah, two individuals, later named as Sentu Debnath and Amar Chandra Das, were taken into custody in relation to the event.

Meanwhile, a campaign is underway to arm Hindutva organizations, who would then arm Hindus to use violence for so-called “Cow Protection”.

Since December 2021, leaders of the Hindutva movement have made an increasing number of such appeals for violence. They also use “cow protection” as justification for carrying lethal firearms.

A leader of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), Sadhvi Saraswati, had previously instructed Hindus to “carry swords to protect cows.”

She claimed that if individuals could afford phones that cost one hundred thousand rupees, they could also afford weapons “to defend cows from those who butcher them.”

“In Karnataka, the cow is sacred,” Saraswati remarked on December 12, 2021, while delivering a speech at the Hindu Sangama event hosted by the VHP and Bajrang Dal at the Karkala Gandhi Maidan. “Such slaughterers have no right to live in this country. Cows are being stolen from the cowsheds of Hindus showing arms. We all should carry swords to save the Gau Matha.”