New Delhi, March 17 Senior Congress leader Pawan Khera on Tuesday sharply criticised the prevailing atmosphere in the country, alleging that festivals which once symbolised shared joy and harmony have been transformed over the past 10 to 12 years into occasions for raucous processions and disturbances.
He urged the Delhi police and the administrative machinery to curb the commodification of religion and restore law and order.
Through a video message on his X handle, he pointed to loud celebrations during Hanuman Jayanti outside Masques and disruptive behaviour inside churches around Christmas as examples of a deliberately created environment of intolerance.
Khera accused the BJP of rewarding individuals who engage in harassment of people wearing skullcaps and beards, lynching, provocative sloganeering, and hate speech, claiming such actions accelerate their rise within the party's ranks.
He referred to a recent incident in Delhi's Uttam Nagar during Holi, where a scuffle between two individuals led to the murder of a man named Tarun, a 26-year-old who died after a clash sparked by a water balloon dispute.
Khera said the RSS (Rashtriya Swyamsevak Sangh) and BJP have communalised and radicalised the episode to an extreme degree, resulting in street marches in Delhi where people openly threaten a "bloody Eid" and speak of wiping out Muslims.
He questioned the Delhi Police on whether they are waiting for a repeat of the 2020 violence, citing other incidents such as the disruption of an Iftar gathering in Varanasi and the brutal assault in Madhubani, Bihar, where a Dalit woman was forced to drink urine and beaten to death.
Khera described such perpetrators as "new Israels" roaming freely and highlighted what he called deep historical ties between the RSS and Israel.
The Congress leader contrasted this with India's past principled support for Palestine under previous governments, which he said earned the nation immense global respect and stature.
He lamented that today, from top to bottom in the government and the BJP, the focus remains obsessively on Israel.
Khera expressed no hope from Prime Minister Narendra Modi, asserting that the RSS has sown seeds of hatred for years, now receiving patronage under Modi's rule, with the BJP's political fortunes rising alongside this harvest of division.
He appealed directly to the Delhi Police and administrative authorities to prevent walls of hatred from rising so high that they obscure the nation's true identity.
Setting politicians and the government aside, Khera addressed Hindus across the country, describing the moment as a profound moral test: whether to allow their religion to be hijacked and commodified by such elements, or to reclaim and protect it.
He urged people to rise against these forces and send the "gangs of hate" back to “their barracks in Nagpur,” expressing confidence that together they will safeguard India's civilisation and heritage from failure, as the world watches.
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