When 50-year-old farmer Mohammad Akhlaq was dragged from his bed by a mob into the streets of Dadri in India, and beaten to death for eating beef, I couldn’t believe it. It seems ludicrous that in the world’s largest democracy, a citizen of the country was publicly lynched for consuming beef! What’s next?
Roughly 250 million Indian citizens are not Hindu. India is their homeland, too – how can their country curtail their freedom so thoughtlessly?
The beef ban is only one in a growing list of restrictions on personal freedom in India, ever since Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government came into power. There have been bans on controversial films and books, and even a ridiculous injunction against the use of the word ‘Bombay’ instead of ‘Mumbai’ in a Bollywood song.
For centuries, India has been a melting pot of diverse cultures and faiths, which have coexisted, often peacefully.
I fear that this sense of community and understanding that has taken centuries to achieve in the country, will crumble like sawdust, with the implementation of the beef ban, and laws like it. It will drive a wedge into the heart of what India is – a democracy.
Modi has repeatedly said he is a proponent of secularism. Then why are incidents like Akhlaq’s death occurring? If I cannot eat what I want or am prevented from feeling safe in my own country – one that calls itself a democracy – then it is a shameful state of affairs, indeed.
— The reader is an Indian entrepreneur based in Dubai
