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08-02-2024
NEW DELHI: Amnesty International has called on Indian authorities to immediately halt the “unlawful” demolitions of Muslim properties, as it released two new reports describing the targeting of homes, businesses and places of worship across several states belonging to the minority community.
Calling the demolitions a form of extra-judicial punishment, the rights group demanded adequate compensation to all those affected by the demolitions that have rendered hundreds of people, most of them Muslims, homeless and their livelihoods destroyed.
The London-based rights group also called on the JCB construction-equipment company, whose bulldozers have been widely used in the “punitive” demolitions, to “publicly condemn the use of its machinery to commit human rights violations”.
The two reports, titled ‘Bulldozer Injustice in India’ and ‘JCB’s Role and Responsibility in Bulldozer Injustice in India’, document demolitions of at least 128 properties between April and June 2022. Amnesty International says the demolitions carried out by bulldozers have rendered at least 617 people either homeless or destroyed their livelihoods.
It says authorities in five states Assam, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi carried out demolitions as a “punishment” following episodes of religious violence or protest by Muslims against discriminatory government policies. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP), which has been accused of running anti-Muslim rhetoric, rules in four out of the five states.
“The unlawful demolition of Muslim properties by the Indian authorities, peddled as ‘bulldozer justice’ by political leaders and media, is cruel and appalling … They are destroying families and must stop immediately,” said Agnes Callamard, Amnesty International’s secretary-general, in a statement on Wednesday.
“The authorities have repeatedly undermined the rule of law, destroying homes, businesses or places of worship, through targeted campaigns of hate, harassment, violence and the weaponisation of JCB bulldozers. These human rights abuses must be urgently addressed.”
Last month, Muslim homes and properties were demolished by bulldozers in the financial hub of Mumbai after communal violence flared in the wake of the inauguration of the Ram temple by Modi in Ayodhya city in northern Uttar Pradesh. The temple was built on the place where the 16th-century Babri mosque stood until 1992, when Hindu mobs demolished it.
Last year, more than 300 Muslim properties were demolished after communal violence on the outskirts of the Indian capital, New Delhi. In 2021, a 100-year-old mosque was demolished in Uttar Pradesh’s Barabanki district, while in 2023, a 16th-century mosque was razed in Prayagraj city, also in Uttar Pradesh, under a road widening project.
