Why Congress-ruled Himachal Pradesh is seeing a Hindutva surge

“This is the first time in 10 years that I felt like an outsider,” said Kaif Rizvi, who runs a small garment shop in Himachal Pradesh’s Solan. Rizvi moved there from his hometown in Bijnor in western Uttar Pradesh in 2015, attracted by how peaceful the hill state was.

However, Rizvi’s idea of Himachal received a rude shock on September 16, when Hindutva supporters, protesting against Muslims migrating from other states, painted a cross on Rizvi’s shop. “People are speaking in an aggressive tone and demanding that clothes sold long ago be taken back,” he said. “I have to comply, who knows what might happen otherwise.”

Himachal was a state where communal tensions were rare. Of late, however, that is changing. In September, several cities in Himachal Pradesh saw rallies against businesses owned by Muslims and mosques that protestors claimed have been built without authorisation.

Travelling across the state, Scroll found that the animosity towards the community stemmed from standard Hindutva conspiracy theories that were often underpinned by economic insecurities triggered by Muslim traders and businessmen from other places.

Politically, some sections of the ruling Congress have also found this new communalism useful. Many leaders hope that supporting the Hindutva mobilisation might help them attract some Hindu votes from the BJP. Moreover, with only 2% of the state’s population being Muslim, the party has little to lose electorally in Himachal.

The communal frenzy

On August 31, a Hindu shopkeeper was assaulted in an altercation at a hair salon owned by a Muslim man in Malyana village, 12 km south of Shimla. A rumour got around that the assailants had taken shelter in a mosque in Sanjauli, a town on the outskirts of Shimla. A sub-inspector of Sanjauli Police told Scroll on the condition of anonymity that though this could not be confirmed, the rumour was enough for the mob to demand that the mosque be demolished.

The mob consisted of Hindutva supporters, shopkeepers, BJP workers and at least three councillors of the Congress, the sub-inspector said. On September 4, state minister Anirudh Singh echoed the mob’s point of view in the Assembly and alleged that Bangladeshis were living in the mosque. The Congress leader demanded that their identities be verified.

Matters came to a head on September 11 when the police stopped a protest march heading towards the mosque. Sanjeev Thakur, the president of the Beopar Mandal in Shimla, told Scroll that the traders’ body called for a bandh on the next day because its members were injured in a lathi charge by the police. However, the sub-inspector said that batons were not used: videos show only water canons being deployed.

Rajinder Singh, president of the management committee of a gurudwara close to the mosque in Sanjauli and an eyewitness to the police action, claimed that nobody was hit by batons. “Where can you see a lathicharge?” he asked, showing videos he shot on September 11. In the videos, the policemen wielding batons could be seen chasing protestors, but not hitting them. Thakur of the Beopari Mandal could not produce any videos of protestors being hit.

Nevertheless, the Beopari Mandal and Hindutva groups had found a common target. Over the next couple of weeks, Hindutva groups demanded the demolition of at least two more mosques in Mandi and Kullu.

In Solan, Palampur, Shillai, Dharamsala, and Paonta Sahib, trader associations united with Hindutva groups to protest against the police action in Sanjauli and the migration of Muslims to the state.

Singh said that the Sanjauli mosque was an excuse to whip up a communal frenzy, pointing out that a Muslim welfare committee has already urged the municipal commissioner to seal the unauthorised portion and also offered to demolish it.

Tikender Panwar, a former deputy mayor of Shimla noted that many religious establishments in the state have been built without permission. “The main aim is to oust Muslims from the state, and in that motive, the Hindutva forces have found an ally in the businessmen class,” said the Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader. “This class has supporters not just of the BJP, but the Congress too.”

The Muslim ‘threat’ to local business

Panwar’s argument that BJP and Congress supporters were united in serving local business interests was evident on ground. Thakur of the Shimla Beopar Mandal is a former BJP councillor. He claimed that the owner of the Sanjauli hair salon had set up three outlets in five years. This, according to Thakur, was a pattern.

“After a Muslim sets up a shop, he calls four of his brothers from his native place, these four will call up forty more,” he said. “You will not see our local Hindu brothers expanding their business like this.”

Thakur’s deputy in the traders’ body Rajkumar Agarwal chimed in. “If one Muslim fruit vendor decides to sell bananas for Rs 100 a dozen, everyone follows suit,” he said. “This is how they control the market.”

In Solan, Kushal Jethi head of the town’s traders’ association and state spokesperson of the Congress, blamed Muslims working as vendors for undercutting shop owners. Jethi echoed Thakur in saying that the number of Muslim vendors in the local market had increased due to migration.

“A roadside vendor selling the same garments as me does not have to pay any taxes or electricity bill,” Jethi said. “Obviously his prices are lower, how do I compete with him?”

Voices against Muslim traders migrating to Himachal Pradesh might have become louder over the last month, but these anxieties have been simmering for some time now.

Shashikant Sharma, a Shimla-based former journalist, said that since tourism helped Himachal Pradesh’s economy grow in the last two decades, many Muslims from western Uttar Pradesh migrated to the state for employment.

“Conveyance from west UP to Himachal is easy, and the wages here are better,” said Sharma. “Many of these Muslims are trained in skilled jobs like tailoring, carpentry and hairdressing. So, they took control of certain sections of the market very quickly.”

The lucrative opportunities in Himachal Pradesh drew increasing numbers of Muslims to the state. Kuldeep Tanwar, a retired bureaucrat and the president of Himachal Kisan Sabha said that this was why Hindu traders started seeing them as a threat.

“Traditionally, Kashmiri Muslims would work in Himachal as porters or labourers in apple orchards,” Tanwar said. “But as Muslims started owning businesses they became more visible in markets within cities. This was not acceptable to the local business owners who were not used to seeing Muslims as competitors.”

The ‘jihad’ trope

The perception that Muslim-owned businesses are posing a threat has prepared the ground for conspiracy theories against the community. Mukesh Sharma, owner of a mobile repair shop in Solan, said that many of the Muslims are migrating to Himachal Pradesh are criminals who have a “jihadi plan” to change the state’s demographics.

“They are setting up shops by offering higher rent,” Sharma said. “How can they afford to do that without international funding?”

The claim that migrant Muslims are being funded to set up businesses by offering higher rents frequently repeated by Hindu traders in the state. Former bureaucrat Tanwar debunked the claim. “Nobody would rent out a shop to a Muslim unless they pay higher rent, so it is a compulsion,” he said. Tanwar added that the migrants live in community setups like mosques and are careful about their spending on daily needs, allowing them to save more money than the local residents.

On the ground, though, Sharma’s conspiracy theory of a “jihadi plan” finds more resonance than Tanwar’s explanation. Many trader associations have demanded that the identities of Muslim migrants be verified.

Kaif Rizvi, the garment seller in Solan, told Scroll that the owner of the shop he runs has asked him to go to the police station and voluntarily show his Aadhaar card and shop permit. A Muslim toy seller in Sanjauli, who requested anonymity, showed Scroll letters he got signed from his MLA and ward member in Shamli, attesting that he was a resident of the city in Uttar Pradesh.

Congress’ Hindutva pivot

Starting from the protests outside the Sanjauli mosque in which Congress councillors participated, the ruling party has aligned itself with the anti-Muslim sentiments in Himachal Pradesh.

While Anirudh Singh’s comments in the Assembly was an example of support from the top, the most striking instance of the Congress’ Hindutva position was minister Vikramaditya Singh's social media statement on September 25 ordering restaurants and food stall owners to display their identity cards.

The move was similar to a decision announced by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Adityanath a day before, directing restaurants in the state to display the names and addresses of their operators, proprietors and managers. This move was seen as an attempt to target Muslims.

However, Singh's order was not put into effect because the chief minister said no such direction had been passed. The Congress’ central leadership also summoned Vikramaditya Singh to Delhi allegedly to discipline him.

The turn of events reveal a tussle between the state Congress and the high command. On ground, the line Vikramaditya Singh took has considerable support. Jethi of Solan Beopar Mandal, who is also a Congress spokesperson, said that not just eateries, but all vendors should be made to display identity cards. “If a person is genuine, he should not have a problem with that,” he said.

A Congress MLA, who requested anonymity, also said that the decision should have been implemented because it had public support.

In Delhi, though, the Congress maintains that Vikramaditya Singh spoke out of turn. Spokesperson Supriya Shrinate told Scroll that it has been clarified enough that Singh’s statement was not the party line. “The matter ends there,” she said.

Observers of Himachal Pradesh politics disagreed. Retired bureaucrat Tanwar said that the Congress government has not done enough to clamp down on the Hindutva voices. “The Congress thinks that by doing this it would attract some Hindu votes, but it is actually playing into the BJP’s hands,” he said.

Shimla-based journalist Shashikant Sharma concurred. “You would see it is Hindutva groups and not really the BJP that is at the forefront of these protests,” he said. “This is because the BJP wants to make this look like a people’s movement and the Congress is falling in this trap.”

On the ground, Muslims said they were disappointed with how the Congress government handled the matter. Comparing Vikramaditya Singh with Adityanath, the toy seller from Shamli summed it up: “Back home [in Uttar Pradesh] we live in fear. Himachal has always been peaceful, let it stay that way. Why do you need to copy someone?”