‘How can Muslims earn their living?’ asks father of Karnataka moral policing victim

Speaking to The Indian Express, Ashiq said, “It was around 9 pm when a woman hired my auto rickshaw from Ujire to Dharmasthala. As I dropped her and was about to return, a gang intercepted and asked me to get down from the autorickshaw. They asked my name and the girl’s name as well. The moment they came to know that I was a muslim and she was Hindu, they assaulted me and took away my mobile phone and purse. The girl who seemed to be a student and was also afraid as they abused her for hiring an autorickshaw of a Muslim. I didn’t even have a chance to escape as they had circled us.”

Ashiq, who was injured in the incident, later filed a complaint. Dharmasthala police registered a case under Sections 143 (unlawful assembly), 147 (rioting), 341 (wrongful restraint), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 149 (every member of unlawful assembly guilty of offence commit­ted in prosecution of common object) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). A police officer said that no arrests have been made so far in the case.

Ashiq’s father Hameed, who is a truck driver, said that it was really an agonising incident. “Why religion is a matter of concern for people to do their business. If people are troubled like this, it would become hard to live in the future,” Hameed said.

This is the third such incident reported in the coastal region of Karnataka within a week. On July 29, Abhijith N Kolpe, a local news portal journalist, was attacked by a few men while he was leaving a restaurant in Mangaluru with his female friend. The men, who claimed to be Hindutva activists, attacked Kolpe alleging he was a Muslim.

On July 27, Police Constable Hanumantappa Kumar and his wife faced abuse and harassment from two persons named Manish and Manjunath while traveling to the police housing from BC Road. Kumar is deployed to assist the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in the coastal region. Claiming that Kumar was a Muslim, a few men attacked them asking what he was doing with a Hindu woman.

The police have arrested two persons each in both the cases.

Though such incidents have been reported earlier too, a special unit — ‘anti-communal wing’ — was formed in Mangaluru in June.

Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who was in Mangaluru on Wednesday, said that the government will curb such incidents in the coastal district but they are facing “starting trouble”.

He then said, “I have issued directions to take strict action against anyone involved in moral policing. No one will be allowed to take the law into their hands. There will be starting trouble (when acting against such incidents). It will get better.”