New Delhi, India – Sitting exterior his house in a slim lane in India’s capital, Mohammad Wajid recounts the killing of his 22-year-old son to a TV journalist.
Inside, the 4 sisters of Mohammad Ishaq look sullen as they huddle collectively at their dimly lit home in New Delhi’s Sundar Nagri space on Wednesday.
“I have lost everything,” Ishaq’s father Abdul Wajid instructed Al Jazeera as his eyes welled up with tears and his voice broke.
At round 5am on Tuesday, a mob tied Ishaq to an iron pole with a leather-based belt and beat him up mercilessly on suspicion that he had stolen “prasad”, or a ritualistic providing, at a prayer event organised by the realm’s Hindus to look at the Ganesh Chaturthi competition.
The event was held three lanes away from Ishaq’s home in Sunder Nagri space of the Indian capital.
“My son was killed because he ate prasad,” Wajid, 60, mentioned. “Those who killed my son found it offensive that a Muslim touched their prasad.”
Wajid, who sells greens in a pushcart, mentioned his Hindu prospects typically provide him the prasad and he accepts it with out a second thought. “Prasad is a gift from bhagwan or Allah. I do not refuse it.”
Killed ‘for taking a banana’
Ishaq’s sister Uzma instructed Al Jazeera her brother was lynched “for taking a banana” and the mob left him tied to the pole after the brutal assault.
“His nails were broken, some taken out and his fingers had cuts. He was brutally beaten because he was a Muslim,” she mentioned. “He was unable to speak and his condition was critical.”
Uzma mentioned Ishaq was discovered mendacity on the highway by a boy from their neighbourhood who picked him up and introduced him house. He succumbed to his accidents a few hours later at his house.
Ishaq’s household mentioned they didn’t take him to hospital. The police mentioned they had been knowledgeable concerning the incident after he had handed away.
As a video of the assault went viral on social media, individuals demanded motion by the police, which registered a case of homicide and arrested six individuals.
“The initial inquiry has found that a group of men stopped him on the suspicion that he was a thief and then they tied and beat him.” Joy N Tirkey, the police official in the realm, mentioned in a video assertion.
According to the neighbours, Ishaq was mentally challenged. “He was a simple boy who did not bring any harm to anyone,” autorickshaw driver Mohammad Saleem, who lives in the identical lane, instructed Al Jazeera.
He mentioned Ishaq would assist everybody in the lane carry their load. “He was a good boy. He never said no. We would pay him 20 or 50 rupees for the job.”
Wajid needs justice for the killing of his solely son.
“We are so far satisfied with the police action but we want the men who killed my son to receive the same fate,” he mentioned.
Assaults and mob lynchings, primarily of Muslims, have been rising in India since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) got here to energy in 2014. The authorities denies the allegation.
Dozens of Muslims have been lynched or attacked by far-right Hindu mobs over suspicion of killing cows, whose slaughter is banned in most Indian states as a result of some Hindus think about cows sacred.
Sharjeel Usmani a New Delhi-based Muslim scholar activist, mentioned Ishaq’s lynching reveals “a dark reality about a shift in how a section of Hindu society practices their religion”.
“Lynching a Muslim has become akin to a ritual and that’s something Hindu leaders must think about,” he mentioned.
Bano, who goes by one identify and lives in the home reverse Wajid’s, instructed Al Jazeera no politician has visited the household to this point.
“They are poor people. They should be helped but we know no one will come because we are Muslim,” she mentioned.
Additional reporting by Sameer Mushtaq
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/9/28/muslim-man-lynched-in-india-for-taking-a-banana-at-hindu-temple-event?traffic_source=rss
