Lawyers supporting the Hindutva ideology VP Singh and BP Singh have filed a petition in the local court alleging that the 800-year-old Shamsi Jama Masjid is a Shiva (one of the Hindu deities) and has been forcibly occupied by Muslims and converted into a mosque was converted.

They were unable to produce any evidence supporting their claim, but petition has been accepted and filed by the local court.

Now their baseless claim is backed by Hindutva party Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha (ABHM)

ABHM says Shams Jama Masjid is just the beginning. “We have a list of about 3,000 Mosques that we have decided to reclaim legally.” 

Since 2014, when Narendra Modi government came to power, India’s 200 million minority Muslims say they have been subjected to persecution, violence and state-sponsored discrimination.

Mosques have begun to be caught up in a wide-ranging project under the BJP to rewrite India’s history according to Hindutva ideology.

The version of history now propagated by BJP leaders, government-backed historians and school curriculums is that of an ancient Hindu nation oppressed and persecuted for hundreds of years by ruthless Muslim invaders, particularly the Islamic Mughal empire that ruled from the 16th to the 19th century.

Destruction of Hindu temples to build mosques has been central to this narrative. In May, a senior BJP leader claimed that Mughals had destroyed 36,000 Hindu temples and they would “reclaim all those temples one by one”.

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are those of the original authors and do not necessarily represent or reflect or endorsed by the management, committee, donors or other partners of 12ummah.com
 
Source:  The Guardian

عربي    |    Türkiye