There has been a spurt in such messages after the murder of one, Kishan Bharwad, in Dhandhuka by certain criminal elements.

NEW DELHI – Outcome of the mindless religious polarisation in Gujarat is there for all to see. Decades after coming to power in the state in early 1980s riding on a wave of popular anti-reservation sentiments, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has kept the cauldron of communalism simmering for political survival.

As things have come to a crunch and everyone is feeling the heat of communal hatred, a group of concerned citizens claiming to be from different parts of Gujarat, have jointly wrote to a letter to the state chief minister, Bhupendrabhai Patel, drawing his attention to hate messaging on the social media and public calls for violence against the Muslim community. There has been a spurt in the hate-filled messages after the unfortunate murder of one, Kishan Bharwad, in Dhandhuka by certain criminal elements.

In the letter, the signatories lauded the role of the police in the case. They appreciated the alacrity with which they responded to this development and instituted an investigation into the matter. Now that the case is under investigation and even the services of the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) have been hired it’s a matter of time before the truth behind the crime will come out. But, they say the vested interests do not seem to be content with anything short of communal conflagration.

To tide over the crisis arising in the wake of the murder, the citizens suggested four measures to be taken for the sake of peace and communal harmony in the state. They are as follows:

1. Direct the police to track, file FIRs against and apprehend those criminal elements propagating hate messages against the Muslim community in the social media and prosecute them.
2. The police should take preventive action so that the situation does not go out of control and result in violence against any community.
3. Preventive arrests of criminal elements who are likely to foment violence against the Muslims
4. Police needs to identify sensitive areas, and protection provided without delay to Muslim settlements where residents are apprehensive of violence by local criminal elements.

They concluded the letter with an earnest appeal to take cognisance of the hate messaging and call for violence against a particular community by rightwing groups.

Over the years, communalism has entered into the culture of Gujarat which has by now come to be known as the laboratory of Hindutva politics. This hatred towards a section of the society (read Muslims) is threatening to do away everything good that the state stands for.  So much so that of late, an average Gujarati seems to have developed an anathema for the culture of hate and mistrust. They are fed up of living in an environment of constant fear.

Following is the list of signatories to the letter:

Akhilesh Dave
Amar Rana
Ambrish Mehta
Anand Yagnik
Apoorva bhai
Atish Indrekar Chhara
Bhanu Parmar
Bharat Bhil
Bharat Jambucha
Bhargav Oza
Bharti Parmar
Bhavik Raja
Bilal Kagzi
Cedric Prakash
Charul Bharwada
Chinu Srinivasan
Dev Desai
Dr. Ghanshyam Shah
Dr.Hanif Lakdawala
Dwarikanath Rath
Geeta Oza
Govind Parmar
Harish Parmar
Hemant Shah
Hidayat Parmar
Hiren Gandhi
Ikram Mirza
Jagdish Patel
Jatin Sheth
Jayesh A Kotecha
Jharna Pathak
Jimmy Dabhi
Johanna Lokhande
Krishnakant bhai
Maherunnisa Desai
Mahesh Pandya
Manishi Jani
Manjula Pradeep
Mathai K.O.
Meenakshi Joshi
Meenakshi Joshi
Mirkhan
Mohammed Zuber
Msh Sheikh Surat
Mudita Vidrohi
Mujahid Nafees
Navdeep Mathur
Nayan Patel
Neeta Hardikar
Neha Shah
Nikunj Desai
Nimisha Desai
Nirjhari Sinha
Nita Mahadev
Parth Trivedi
Persis Ginwalla
Prakashbhai Shah
Prasad Chacko
Pratik Rupala
Preeti Oza
Rafi Malek
Raghavan Rangarajan
Raju Param
Rakesh Maheriya
Rohit Prajapati
Sanjay Bhave
Satya Oza
Shamshad Pathan
Shantilal Parmar
Sharif Malek
Shaukat Indori
Sheba George
Sugeet Pathakji
Sushila
Sushila Prajapati
Svati Joshi
Swati Desai
Swati Goswami
Tapan Dasgupta
Trupti Parekh
Uttam Parmar
Vaseef Hussain
Vijay Parmar
Vikram Vajir
Vinay Mahajan
Waqar Qazi
Xavier Manjooran
Zuber Shaikh