India should protect rights of Muslims amid COVID-19 crisis: OIC

Mon, April 20, 2020

JEDDAH: The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation's (OIC) human rights body on Sunday condemned the "unrelenting vicious Islamophobic campaign in India maligning Muslims for spread of COVID-19"— the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.

In a statement issued Sunday, the OIC's Independent Permanent Human Rights Commission (IPHRC) also condemned the "negative profiling [of Muslims in India] in media subjecting them to discrimination & violence with impunity".

The international body called upon the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government to take notice of and "take urgent steps to stop the growing tide of Islamophobia in India".

The Indian government should "protect the rights of its persecuted Muslim minority as per its obligations" under international human rights laws, it added.

Prime Minister Imran Khan, too, had tweeted about India's wicked tactics earlier in the day, comparing the Narendra Modi-led government to the Nazis.

"The deliberate & violent targeting of Muslims in India by Modi Govt to divert the backlash over its COVID19 policy, which has left thousands stranded & hungry, is akin to what Nazis did to Jews in Gerrmany," PM Imran wrote.

"Yet more proof of the racist Hindutva Supremacist ideology of Modi Govt," he added.

'Corona jihad'

An New York Times report earlier this week said the outbreak of coronavirus in India had triggered a series of attacks against Muslims across the country, with the health ministry of Modi's Hindu nationalist government claiming that Muslims were spreading the virus.

“Young Muslim men who were passing out food to the poor were assaulted with cricket bats. ... Other Muslims have been beaten up, nearly lynched, run out of their neighborhoods or attacked in mosques, branded as virus spreaders,” the paper said.

It highlighted that Hindu extremists were scapegoating the country’s entire Muslim population for deliberately spreading the virus through “corona jihad”.

India's almost 'genocidal' treatment of Muslims

Earlier, Indian author and activist Arundhati Roy had told Deutsche Welle (DW) the New Delhi government was trying to instigate communal rifts as it was exploiting the coronavirus issue against its minority Muslim community.

The author had said "the situation is approaching genocidal", telling the foreign publication that the coronavirus pandemic had laid bare the facet of India that "all of us knew".

"We are suffering, not just from COVID, but from a crisis of hatred, from a crisis of hunger,” she had said, adding that the world needs to keep its eyes on the matter of anti-Muslim hatred in India.

Linking the fresh wave of singling out Muslims during the pandemic to the recent Delhi riots, she had said it began with people protesting against the anti-Muslim citizenship law. Under the guise of COVID-19, the Hindu nationalist government was arresting young students and fighting cases against lawyers, media personnel, activists, and intellectuals.

Roy had termed the current wave of vitriol against Muslims tantamount to the one by Nazis during the Holocaust.

Princess slams Indian expat for targeting Muslims

Sharjah's Princess Sheikha Hend bint Faisal Al Qassemi had also slammed an Indian expatriate for targeting Muslims and claiming that Hindus were facing a hard time in the Middle East.

Saurabh Upadhyay had said Hindus had built cities such as Dubai from scratch and had big stakes across major ventures in the Middle East. He had also criticised Muslims for the Tablighi Jamaat incident in New Delhi.

In response, the princess had said: "You make your bread and butter from this land that you scorn and your ridicule will not go unnoticed.

"Anyone that is openly racist and discriminatory in the UAE will be fined and made to leave," she had added.

Meanwhile, Saudi scholar Abidi Zahrani expressed his concerns over the hatred against Muslims, saying "militant Hindus" who were spreading hatred and committing crimes against Muslims should be sent back to India.

In a tweet, Zahrani said Gulf States hosted millions of Indians, some of whom were infected with COVID-19 and were treated free of charge regardless of their faith "while Hindutva Terrorists gangs are committing crimes against Muslims citizens".

—Additional input from APP

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