Recent instances of targeted hate crimes against the Hindu community and its temples by Khalistani and Islamic radicals in Canada, the USA and the UK point towards the worrying trends of rising Hinduphobia in the West.
The everyday instances of discrimination and violence against Hindus due to Islamic extremism are common in the Indian subcontinent. Hindus have endured this suffering for ages. However, recent attacks on them in so-called liberal democracies have time and again proved that there is no escape from this violent Islamic ideology and so-called liberals and Khalistani are useful idiots in this hateful campaign by Islamists against Hindus.
Network Contagion Research Institute, a US-based scientific research organization in its recent report points out that there has been a 1,000 per cent rise in anti-Hindu hate and attacks on the members of the community across the world, including in the USA. The report reflects the dangerous hybridization of hate against the Hindu diaspora particularly in the West. In the words of Joel Finkelstein co-founder of the Network Contagion Research Institute, “We’ve seen that there’s been a growth of over 1,000 per cent and anti-Hindu slurs are stoking fears of replacement mixing with anti-semitic memes, with other forms of narratives, and hatred shared by white supremacists, by Islamists, and others, and creating a toxic atmosphere of hostility”.
This article with the help of independent reports and many recent instances of hate crimes and discrimination against the Hindu diaspora community shows the rising trend of Hindu phobia in countries like the USA, Canada and the UK.
To start with, North America has served as a natural home for Indian talent from various walks of life and Indian Americans particularly Hindus have a huge role in the prosperity of this region. However, in recent times this is increasingly becoming unsafe for American Hindus. Reports of a US-based organisation namely Coalition of Hindus of North America (CoHNA) sheds more light on rising hate crimes against Hindus. This organisation in its statement points out that
“Hindus are a vibrant and diverse community that has contributed significantly to American progress, well-being, and democratic values, whether during the COVID-19 pandemic or in the day-to-day things that make the US a great nation”. “Yet, our community is often the target of bigotry and hate, as witnessed in the recent attack on a local temple in New York and the twice desecration of the Gandhi statue on temple premises”.
Similar findings have been pointed out in a historic study done by researchers at Rutgers University on the rise of Hinduphobia and anti-Hindu hatred on social media and other messaging platforms. According to it, there has been a dramatic rise in hate speech and hateful memes directed towards the Hindu community across social media platforms often amplified by Islamists and Khalistani radical elements accusing Hindus of committing genocide of minorities in India. The study finds that Islamists and other extremists are increasingly using genocide memes, tropes and code words to spread Hinduphobia. For example, the term ‘Pajeet’ has been prominently used to describe Hindus in a derogatory manner. Also, deliberate uses of Hindu religious symbols like the Swastika are done for ulterior motives like violence against Hindus and the defacement of Hindu temples. These findings about rising hate crimes against Indian Americans further gets verified by the 2020 FBI data, according to which hate crimes against Indian Americans are up by 500 per cent. And the irony is that this is despite the fact more than 100 Indian-origin people are occupying prominent positions in the government.
A Delhi-based think tank namely Centre for Democracy, Pluralism and Human Rights (CDPHR) working in the arena of human rights in its recently released report on human rights in the USA has also pointed towards the rampant discrimination and hate crimes against the peaceful Hindu diaspora community. In the words of Dr Prerna Malhotra, head of CDPHR, “Freedom of Religion is one area in which the USA makes much noise, but it fails in practice as it has its own preferred religions. Religious minorities, particularly non-Abrahamic religions, like Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, and Jains routinely face discrimination”. This report also points out that North American Universities have been sponsoring attacks on Hinduism. For example, recently, the University of California at Davis sponsored a Hindu phobic conference which targeted Hinduism and propagated the hateful messages of certain Christian and Islamic fundamentalists. Also, Hindus have been a particular target of the racially entrenched North American political establishment, media and academia.
In North America, Canada is worse as far as hate crimes against Hindus are concerned. Here, with active support from the political establishment to Khalistani radicals, hate crimes against Hindus have seen a rising trend in recent times, particularly during and in the aftermath of farm law protests in India. Hindu temples in particular are targets of these hate crimes. The situation has become so worse that the Indian government is routinely issuing an advisory for Indians living in Canada on many occasions. Chandra Arya, a Canadian lawmaker while speaking in the House of Commons clearly stressed that “The increasingly vocal and well-organised anti-India and anti-Hindu groups in Canada has resulted in increasing anti-Hindu sentiments and Hindu-Canadians are legitimately concerned about rising Hinduphobia in Canada”. This worrying trend gets reflected in the report of Statistics Canada, an official Canadian government agency which points out that there has been a 72 per cent surge in incidents of hate crime between 2019 and 2021 and Canadian Hindus are major victims of this.
Whether it is the sacrilege of Swaminarayan Mandir in Toronto or defacement of another Hindu temple in New York or the recent violence at Leicester in the UK, the role of Khalistani separatists in fomenting anti-Hindu sentiments is increasingly being noticed. These Khalistani radicals often operating hand in glove with Islamists have become a menace to the peaceful Hindu diaspora in the West. They routinely intimidate Hindus on prominent Hindu festivals or on Indian independence or republic day functions. For example, on the occasion of 15th August, A UK-based Khalistani group proudly confessed that they (Sikh radicals) vehemently opposed and pushed Hindus out of Slough city of UK. Similarly, in a disgusting incident at fast-food joint Taco Bell in California’s Fremont, a Sikh radical named Tejinder Singh verbally harassed Krishnan Jayaraman for being a practising Hindu and ridiculed his religious beliefs.
In the Western world, the United Kingdom is another centre of Islamic and Khalistani radicalisation. From being a recruiting ground for ISIS to Jihadi grooming gangs at home, it has become a major hotspot for hate crimes against the successful Hindu community. Its political establishment has allowed this disease of Islamic radicalisation to foster in the name of multiculturalism and in pursuit of appeasement politics. UK Home Office data shows hate crimes against Hindus have gone up from 58 in 2017-18 to 166 in 2020-21, a rise of almost 200 per cent in just four years. These crimes involve racial abuses, violent attacks on Hindus and vandalism of their properties and temples.
A recent incident of a Muslim mob vandalising a temple and several properties belonging to members of the Hindu community in Leicester city of United Kingdom summarises the constant fear under which Hindus are forced to live in the Western cities with significant Muslim and Khalistani demography. These recent targeted attacks against Hindus come after the defeat of Pakistan in the Asia Cup cricket match on August 28 between India and Pakistan. Though for Islamists mere existence of Hindus is a grave provocation but minor instances like loss at a cricket match provide them an opportunity to vent out their hatred against Hindus.
The spate of hate crimes against Hindus has significantly increased during and after the farm laws and CAA agitation in India. The rising trend of Hinduphobia in the UK is also reflected in the recently released report of the Centre for Holistic and Integrated Studies (CHIS) which observes that “An incisive study of the cases of Hinduphobia in the UK show that Muslims and other adversaries have attacked Hindus time and again over issues which are central to Hindu culture. For instance, on many occasions, Hindu festivities have been disrupted, their temples vandalised, their deities mocked, and religious symbols destroyed. This reflects the deep-seated hatred and fear that Islamists hold for Hindu civilisation. In the last one-year, religious hate crimes have increased by 9 per cent in the UK. As observed on the ground, Hinduphobia has risen severely”.
The above description of a worrying trend of Hinduphobia clearly exposes the inhumane Hinduphobic propensity of Western liberal democracies. However, what is worse is that despite being the victim of these violent attacks, Hindus are painted as aggressors thanks to the total narrative control by Islamists, Khalistani and liberals including brown Hindu sepoys. Western media with support from their Indian counterparts have played the role of whitewashing the crimes of Islamists and Khalistani radicals.
For example, Pratap Bhanu Mehta in his article (Exporting division, IE, September 23) blamed the Modi government being in power as the reason for the recent Leicester riots and called on MEA to issue a statement instructing Hindus in the UK not to chant “Jai Shri Ram” in so-called “Muslim Areas”. Today anti-India protests in these countries are synonymous with anti-Hindu sentiments. Hindu diaspora, for most of the time, has shown reluctance to speak against this hatred but they can no longer afford this silence. Despite being at key political, administrative and business positions, being painted as an aggressor shows the narrative slipping out of the hands of successful Hindus and that’s why it is necessary for the community to raise their voice on all platforms against the unholy alliance of Islamists-Khalisanis and liberals particular brown sepoys. At the same time, it is the civilizational duty of the Indian government to protect the interests of the Hindu diaspora and mere routine condemnation via MEA will not do much now.