Mumbai, April 11 The Shiv Sena (UBT) on Saturday flagged what it described as the rise of a “new breed” of Hindutva proponents in Maharashtra whose outrage, it alleged, is guided more by political convenience than consistent moral standards.
In an editorial published in party mouthpiece Saamana, the Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray-led faction referred to the recent discourse in Nashik surrounding allegations of “Corporate Jihad”, wherein Muslim employees of a multinational IT firm were accused of luring Hindu women with job offers, subjecting them to sexual exploitation and allegedly pressuring them into religious conversion.
The editorial mentions that political figures associated with the BJP, including party minister Nitesh Rane and legislator Gopichand Padalkar, have led aggressive protests, noting that while the outrage against such exploitation is justified, the political framing of the issue has been intense, with leaders delivering fiery speeches on the "terrifying" nature of Love Jihad in the region.
The editorial sharply critiques the "shameless" inconsistency of these political groups. While they demand Special Investigation Teams (SITs) for probe and organise mass marches when an accused is a Muslim, they have reportedly ignored the harrowing actions of sexual exploitation by local figures, including self-styled godman Ashok Kharat and NGO operator Ravindra Erande from Nashik.
“The scale of the alleged abuse by these 'godmen' is significant. Ashok Kharat, an accused of exploiting hundreds of women under the guise of 'purification rituals' and 'Yoni-Puja'. Reports indicate that over 100 videos of these acts have surfaced, involving the use of drugs to incapacitate victims and blackmail to ensure silence. Even pregnant women were reportedly not spared. Ravindra Erande was recently apprehended with 121 obscene videos. He allegedly trapped women by promising government jobs or business assistance, subsequently exploiting them and filming the acts for blackmail,” said the editorial.
The Thackeray camp argues that the safety and dignity of women should be a "secular" concern, treated with equal gravity regardless of the perpetrator's faith, saying that "True Hindutva" involves the protection of women and a firm stance against superstition and hypocrisy.
According to Uddhav Thackeray-led Shiv Sena, if there is a genuine desire to seek justice for the women of Nashik, those leading the protests must address the "sins" within their own community.
“While the 'Corporate Jihad' deserves condemnation, the exploitation of women by figures like Kharat and Erande must be denounced with equal fervour. Today, it appears the "sins" of these hypocritical Hindutvavadis are what float most prominently in the waters of the Godavari. Violence against women, at the very least, should remain secular,” it claims.
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