Mob Lynching In India 2014-2024: BBC Interview of Zafarul Islam Khan

Zafarul-Islam Khan (born 1948) is an Indian scholar, author and journalist based in New Delhi. He was the editor of the Indian Muslims’ leading English publication, The Milli Gazette, from its inception in January 2000 to December 2016. He is the founder and chairman of Charity Alliance, an organization involved in relief and welfare work in India & the Managing Director of Pharos Media & Publishing Pvt Ltd. Dr Khan is the author and translator of over 50 books in Arabic, English and Urdu. In 2023 his annotated English translation of the Holy Quran was published as “The Glorious Quran” which has been acclaimed as one of the best English translation of the Muslim holy book. His latest book is a compilation of lynchings of Muslims from 2014 to 2024. The book is available in India currently and will be available in other countries soon.

Order the book (currently available in India and soon in other parts of the world) here > https://pharosmedia.com/books/

ENGLISH TRANSCRIPT:

Interviewer:

Incidents of mob lynching in India have been making headlines for the past decade. They are also discussed and anger and sadness are expressed. But is there a plan behind them? What laws have been made for them? And how much of these laws are enforced? We are talking today to understand this to Dr. Zafaral Islam Khan Saheb who recently published a report. This report covers the period from June to May 2024. More than seventeen hundred incidents of mob lynching have been documented. Doctor, what is the most important finding of your study? Any examples that surprised you?

Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan:

You will be surprised to see this in the report that the victims of mob lynching are more Hindus than Muslims. Almost double. But there is a difference.

That mob lynching which is caused by hatred, the only people who die because of hate are Muslims. And some are even Christian. A few, but that percentage is very small. Even so, their percentage in the population is very small, so its less.

The hatred towards Muslims is why are you Muslim?

Why are you different from us?

Why do you pray?

Why do you wear a cap.

Why do you have a beard?

Why is your dress different?

And without anyone knowing someone. That is, if you know someone, then one may hate the person in a personal way. It may even make some sense. But without knowing anyone, just because the person has a different look, his clothes are different. (They) catch him and kill him for what he is.

Interviewer:

It has also been stated in your report that after Prime Minister Modi came to power in 2014 Cow Vigilantes or Mob Lynching in general has increased.

Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan:

Lynching its not like this is the first time it has happened in India it’s not like that. But since 2014 it has received a boost, so you see that in the report, you have been given a chart in it. This government that came to power in 2014, May of 2014. Ten years since then it has had two terms. We have taken these two terms. And in 2014 & 2015, lynchings didn’t happen, or very few. Meaning, maybe few lynchings may have happened. But after that, in sixteen seventeen eighteen nineteen, twenty, twenty-one twenty-two twenty-three twenty-four, suddenly the graph starts growing. And as the election approaches the graph gets higher

Interviewer:

So could this also be a coincidence? That social media, and in digital media, which has suddenly become very big. Because of this now things are starting to get more documented. And they are circulating, more documentation?

Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan:

Look at what has happened with digital media. Its that one can spread hate. And it can be spread easily and in “no-time”. WhatsApp and others have placed some limitations on it. You can’t send as much. But in no-time you can reach thousands of people. So what is it that has happened from this? There are people who spread hatred. For those who are doing this kind of thing (lynchings). Now someone is saying that I saw a cow in the area. I mean, cow (blood) being spilled. Even if nothing has been proven yet. And they send it (on social media). So immediately the people of that area will gather there. So it’s very easy to gather people. And then the people who do the lynchings. In almost every case these people make videos of every incident and spread it out. This also proves that they know that “nothing will happen to us”. Mob lynching almost all of them have happened in BJP ruled states. It can happen other (states) also. There may be some by chance, but it’s very low. It happens specially in BJP ruled states, and if I want to name a state, then Haryana can be named? And to a certain extent Madhya Pradesh & Rajasthan also. In these the local governments have given encouragement to these people. The Ground Reality is that the police do nothing, or makes a counter case against the victim. It is very normal that the counter case is done by police themselves, or those who are the killers, the murderers, they do the same thing (bring a case against the victim). Then the victim’s family will say, ok, we take back the complaint, we take it back, you take (the case) back too. So in a way, it gets compromised and the problem ends there.

Interviewer:

During your studies, did you find cases where they reached the courts, to the point of convictions or acquittals, or are still being heard?

Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan:

In those cases which were heard and the decision has been made. Such cases are very rare. The event around the beginning, is the incident of Akhlaq.. It’s in the very early years (of lynchings) from 2016. In that it has not been proven till date, or rather, it was proven that the meat that was being talked about in his freezer. That wasn’t beef. It was normal meat, but based on this (suspicion of beef) he was murdered. And he wasnt just killed, but the system is like this. The killers are known, who they are, its on paper, but they have not been identified in court so far.

That’s not just it , but the UP government wrote, with the permission of the Governor, they wrote to the court asking that the court case against the killers of Akhlaq be withdrawn. And the Judge said, “Has this ever happened before in India that a murder case has been withdrawn?” and so (the court) denied it.

Interviewer:

Doctor Sb, just like we talk about Cow vigilantism or attack on people due to allegations of Beef consumption or carrying beef, so can we draw a general profile which can be seen about the attackers and the victims?

Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan:

These murders of mob lynchings are not ordinary murders, such as if a shot was fired and the person was killed. No, lets take the case of Qasim, which is the case from Hapur (a town in UP). In that case, his relatives said that “I wish those people had shot him.”

Rather, he was tortured and killed, beaten repeatedly. Things (were inserted) in his body such as a screw, his skin was scraped, and the body was pulled. The attackers normally are young, unemployed young men who have no work. And I have no proof but in return for being (in the lynching mob) they must be getting money.

Now a cow that is in good condition, or a buffalo that is in good condition is worth about eighty thousand rupees. If in a truck there are fifteen to twenty cows thats worth a significant amount of money when you multiply. Reuters reported that for the last three or four years, they made an estimate of how many cattle have been stolen? This is theft, this is looting but there are no questions about this looting. The police don’t ask anything. Nor the judiciary asks anything. When a man dies there are a lot of losses with it. His family is ruined. His children are ruined.

Interviewer:

In such a situation, for justice for these families. What path is left for redress? Any compensation?

Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan:

No, no compensations are given. Except for a few cases they keep on struggling like this. Now what do these poor people have. All these people who are victims, these are not rich or educated people. These are poor people. These poor people don’t have as much money, that they can for years and years, go to the courts, and that too in a hostile environment in which they will continue to be threatened if they continue their struggle, that if they do they will be killed. And what does it mean to fight? They don’t even have the ability that they can hire a good lawyer.

The Supreme Court in 2018 released official guidelines about mob lynching which mentions official negligence. It was a good thing , but they didn’t follow up on this. If they had followed up then lynching would have stopped. And if they had followed up then bulldozer justice (might not continue) which is still happening today even as we are speaking, someone’s house, someone’s mosque, someone’s madrasa is being demolished.

The Supreme Court said in 2018 that there should be a proper law, and before, things used to be governed by normal law. But BNS (Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita replaced the pre-colonial Indian Penal Code) which has been released in 2023, has no mention of mob lynching in it. But says that mob violence is that in which at least five people participate and someone dies because of (that violence).

But it was not implemented. For cow slaughter which have different laws in different states. Somewhere five years’ imprisonment, several eight-year, or ten years. (Anyone who breaks the laws) then he should get that. That’s ok. We have no complaint.

But just blaming someone (about cow slaughter) is not enough. It should be proven in court if it happened or not. But here , one makes the accusation, and in one hour (the mob) has also ended it with an execution regardless of if the person really did it or not. In a civilized society this shouldn’t happen. People taking the law in their hands is wrong. And any government BJP or not should discourage this very intensely.