By Yusuf Ansari
New Delhi, April 24, 2020: A group of former civil service officers of India has written an open letter to all state chief Ministers and heads of federally-ruled regions to check the persecution of Muslims accusing them of spreading the coronavirus pandemic.
The 101 officers, who had worked for the federal and state government and united under the banner of the constitutional group since 2017, wrote the letter on April 23 and sent a copy to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
They had earlier organized conclaves and writing letters to the federal and states governments on matters of national concern.
In the latest letter they pointed that the oppression of Muslims has come on a large scale in different parts of India after the meeting of Tablighi Jamaat in New Delhi’s Nizamuddin area in March.
The officers alleged that some political parties and a large section of media to give communal color to the coronavirus intentionally. They wrote that the cases of Covid-19 were coming up in the country from January 30, but the Jamaat was criticized for ignoring the principles of social disturbance and spreading the coronavirus throughout the country.
“We are a group of former civil servants belonging to the All-India and Central Services, from all over India. As a group, we do not subscribe to any particular political ideology but rather focus on issues that have a bearing upon the Indian Constitution. We have been holding Conclaves and writing Open Letters on matters of concern since we came together as the Constitutional Conduct Group in June 2017,” the letter asserts.
The group expressed anguish over reports of harassment of Muslims, especially after the Tablighi Jamaat meeting.
The Jamaat was criticized for ignoring the principles of social distancing when cases of COVID-19 had started emerging in the country. Although this was hardly the only incident of such gatherings, both political and religious, sections of the media hastened to give a communal color to COVID-19, the letter says.
The group termed as misguided and condemnable the Jamaat organizing the event ignoring the Delhi government’s advisories. “However, the action of the media in communalizing it and extending it to the Muslim community as a whole is utterly irresponsible and reprehensible,” the letter says.
The former officials say such coverage has fueled hostility towards the Muslim community in parts of India.
“Fake video clips have been doing the rounds showing Muslim vendors spitting on the fruits and vegetables that they have for sale – purportedly to spread the Covid-19 disease. Cases have been reported of vegetable vendors being asked their religion, even being assaulted when they mention Muslim names.”
The group says the fear and insecurity generated by the pandemic is sought to be channeled into the “othering” of the Muslim community to keep them out of public spaces, “purportedly to protect the rest of the population.”
The former officials mentioned many incidents of social boycott of Muslims. ‘There are reports from Hoshiarpur that Muslim Gujjars who traditionally migrate from Punjab to Himachal Pradesh with their cattle were denied entry at the border by the police due to apprehension of tension created by mobs on the other side to prevent their entry.”
Social media posts show men, women, and children forced to take shelter on the banks of the Swan River, where hundreds of liters of milk had to be dumped following the blockade. Photos from a market in Biharsharif, Nalanda district, Bihar, show pictures of flags being affixed to the carts of non-Muslim vendors with exhortations that buyers should only purchase products from such carts.
The group says the “seemingly isolated incidents” appear to be building up to the ostracism of Muslims.
“More disturbingly, reports of discrimination are also coming in from various places about Muslims being turned away from hospitals and health facilities,” the group said and cited an April 8 case if Fauzia Shaheen, a full term pregnant weaver from Madanpura in Varanasi, who turned away from clinics and hospitals even after she delivered a baby outside the hospital.”
Following an outcry in social media, police registered a case against the management of a cancer hospital in Meerut that had put out an advertisement saying that it would treat Muslims only when they produce a report showing that they have tested negative for coronavirus. A hospital in Ahmedabad reportedly designated separate sections for Muslim patients of Coronavirus.
“The entire country is going through unprecedented trauma. We can endure, survive and overcome the challenges that this pandemic has imposed on us only by remaining united and helping each other,” the former officers assert.
Some of the signatories are K.P. Fabian IFS, former Ambassador to Italy, Anita Agnihotri, former secretary, federal department of Social Justice Empowerment, S.P. Ambrose, former Additional Secretary, Ministry of Shipping, Rachel Chatterjee, former Special Chief Secretary, Agriculture, Andhra Pradesh and Salahuddin Ahmad, former Chief Secretary, Rajasthan
Source: twocirlces.net