Dubai: While 28-year-old Rakbar Khan lay bleeding, it took Alwar police more than three hours to travel six kilometres and get him to the nearest hospital in Ramgarh, Rajasthan.
Khan is the latest victim of mob lynching by cow vigilantes in India. But what were the police doing in those crucial three hours?
According to a Times of India report, the police officers first took the two cows, recovered from the lynching scene, to a gaushala (cow shelter) 10km away. The cows reached their destination at 3am, a whole hour before Khan was brought in to the Community Health Centre in Ramgarh.
By then, he was already dead.
Rahul Gandhi, President of the Indian National Congress party, tweeted another reason for the delay.
He wrote: “Policemen in #Alwar took 3 hrs to get a dying Rakbar Khan, the victim of a lynch mob, to a hospital just 6 KM away. Why? They took a tea-break en route. This is Modi’s brutal ‘New India’ where humanity is replaced with hatred and people are crushed and left to die.”
Policemen in #Alwar took 3 hrs to get a dying Rakbar Khan, the victim of a lynch mob, to a hospital just 6 KM away.
— Rahul Gandhi (@RahulGandhi) July 23, 2018
Why?
They took a tea-break enroute.
This is Modi’s brutal “New India” where humanity is replaced with hatred and people are crushed and left to die. https://t.co/sNdzX6eVSU
Three people have been arrested so far, from Alwar’s Lallawandi village, and the investigation has been transferred to senior police officials, who are expected to investigate why it took so long for the victim to get medical attention.
Twitter users are furious at the way mob lynchings have grown under the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government. A compilation by Indian news website The Quint points to around 99 deaths due to mob lynching since 2015.
The situation has become so bad, an Indian social media influencer released a song on mob lynching yesterday, titled ‘Bhediye’ or wolves. It is parodied on the song ‘Heeriye’ from Bollywood film Race 3.
Some of the lyrics go: “Wolves have descended on the streets/They think WhatsApp is god/Logic has left their minds/A curtain of fake promises cover their eyes…”
Tweep @dhruv_rathee who shared the video, begins with the note: “Dedicated to all those who think: ‘Uncle has sent the video, so it must be true.’”
There's now a song on Mob Lynching ...https://t.co/yhI6S7EQxr
— Dhruv Rathee (@dhruv_rathee) July 22, 2018
With lynchings seemingly occurring every few weeks, with Saturday’s Alwar incident being the latest, social media users were concerned about where India was heading. Many blame Narendra Modi and his silence over the issue.
Advocate Lata Chauhan @latachauhan1 tweeted: “Sad. Really heart wrenching. Why can’t our PM and the Home Minister stop this madness, this anguish? If they cannot, they must go. This is not the country of Ram, Buddha and Gandhi anymore.”
Manoj Mishra @MM09021996 tweeted: “There comes a time when the python becomes a fearsome animal, devouring everyone. But then it becomes slow and an easier target to identify. The BJP python is too big to slide and slither away. The end is near.”
But while they are in power, it appears some BJP supporters can get away with anything.
Social media users criticised Prashant P. Umrao @ippatel this morning, for justifying lynching. Umrao’s twitter bio states he is an advocate and an advisor/faculty member at IIP School of Journalism.
He tweeted: “Alwar victim Akbar was a cow butcher and was arrested in 2014 also for cow smuggling. Don’t support lynching but if you continue to hurt Hindu’s religious sentiments intentionally, then we have no other option.”
Umrao shot to fame over the case of the disqualification of Aam Aadmi Party MLAs (Member of Legislative Assembly) in Delhi. Following this, he was supported by prominent BJP leaders, who hailed him as a crusader for righteousness. He has a history of spreading fake news on social media.
He has since deleted his tweet, but twitter users have shared it via screenshots.
@I_amRahulSingh tweeted in response to Umrao and wrote: “You are a lawyer and still, you are saying we don’t have any other option. Brother, where has your humanity gone? Cow vigilantes are nothing but terrorists. I am also a Hindu and a very big supporter of BJP. We should never support lynching of people. Please spread love around the world.”
Other tweeps shared videos of Khan’s distraught widow, Asmeena, and asked the Indian government to take action so villagers can live and make a living, without fear.
Twitter user @IronyOfIndia_ wrote: “‘He was killed because he’s a Muslim, Modi is getting Muslims killed… They could’ve sent him to jail, beaten him up, at least they should have spared his life,’ says Asmeena…”
“He was killed because he’s a Muslim, Modi is getting Muslims killed… They could’ve sent him to jail, beaten him up, at least they should have spared his life,” says Asmeena, widow of #RakbarKhan who was lynched on rumours of cow smuggling in #Alwar #Rajasthan pic.twitter.com/sEjlaprLKM
— Irony Of India (@IronyOfIndia_) July 22, 2018
With a rhetoric of blame prevalent in the country, when does it all end, tweeps ask?
Mubashir Gulzar @realist_virtual tweeted: “Humanity at its lowest! Today, it is Muslims, tomorrow it could be Hindus. A lynch mob is just a murderous bunch of monsters driven by the political agenda of their masters, who themselves are no less monsters.”
— With inputs from Evangeline Elsa, Community Solutions Editor
