How the Congress govt in Telangana is enabling Hindutva and hate

Hyderabad: I think the headline is enough to understand where I’m going with this piece. All of us expect and know what the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Hindutva groups stand for in our political milieu. Anything that challenges their ideological boat is a threat. And as things stand, with the social fabric and harmony under stress today, we expected the Congress to take a strong and even defiant moral stand against Hindutva and hate in Telangana, a state with a dominant minority population in its capital of Hyderabad.

Alas, the Congress has not just been disappointing, but absolutely pitiful and useless in containing communal trouble ever since it came to power. And not just that, the party and its senior leaders are abnormally quiet when it comes to hate and communal incidents, both in Hyderabad and across Telangana. 

Worst of all, its leaders are even welcoming hate mongers into their homes. This, I believe, shows us where its leaders in states stand ideologically.

Deputy Chief Minister Bhatti Vikramarka, whom I have always held in high regard as a leader, earlier this month welcomed the notorious hate monger Dhrirendra Shastri, aka Bageshwar, into his home. The Hindutva godman’s anti-Muslim statements are all available online for anyone to see. So, I am wondering what message this sends to people who are secular, especially when your party’s face and the Leader of Opposition, Rahul Gandhi, is staunchly anti-Hindutva and bats for secularism.

Bipolar Congress in Telangana?

What is this bipolar behaviour? Moreover, this is also very funny in one way, because anytime a CM has to be chosen, or anything major has to be decided in a state, leaders love to parrot one line: “The high command will make a decision.” But when the high command is seemingly clear on its position about being secular and anti-hate or anti-BJP, state leaders clearly don’t care and seem to act on it. 

If this is where the Congress is, then perhaps it is a matter of time before it empties into the BJP.

In the past, the Congress has often accused the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) of being secretly in bed with the BJP for various reasons. What are we to say when the same Congress in Telangana is openly doing it? Anytime there is a hate or communal incident, the ruling party is mostly silent or just looks the other way when asked about it. I have on several occasions in conversations asked state Congress leaders, and many say that they don’t want to give the BJP space by talking about Hindutva. 

Someone needs to tell them that by not doing so, they are, in fact, allowing hate to spread.

Also, I think I can attest to the fact that the police and state response to communal incidents under the BRS was a lot better and swifter. I am not saying this lightly at all. In recent months, communal incidents have become more and more common — a regular feature of daily life. For example, the attack on an Urdu teacher in Nizamabad was absolutely shocking. Sure, I understand why a few parents may have had a problem with their children accidentally being taught Urdu, but it turned into a full-blown communal incident, with the principal of the school getting assaulted in front of the police.

Urdu is the second official language of Telangana and is a part of the cultural identity for many Muslims (I’m not saying all, as many across districts are more in tune with Telugu). To see someone get beaten for teaching Urdu is something unheard of. But aside from that, campaigns by right-wing groups and influencers over small incidents have been blowing up online, without any kind of redressal. It is honestly scary to watch our state go down this path.

The case of an auto driver’s communal message on his vehicle snowballed into a huge issue on social media in the last few weeks, with local influencers to even other auto drivers being used to propagate that Hindus in Telangana are facing oppression of all kinds. The episode pertains to the driver, C Bharat Kumar, writing the following on the back of his vehicle: “Anyone born on this earth is a Hindu, Jai Shri Ram! Changing your religion is like changing your father.”

This prompted a local person to question Kumar and the matter eventually reached the Attapur Police on July 14. The incident in Hyderabad galvanised the right-wing in Telangana online, with even senior BJP leaders and Union Minister Bandi Sanjay using it to push hate.

We keep talking about the south being different and impervious to the BJP’s Hindutva, but I think it’s time we accept that this has changed and that Telangana is on the cusp of a breakthrough for them.

Let’s not forget that the BJP in the 2023 Telangana Assembly elections managed to increase its vote share to 20 per cent from the seven per cent it had in 2018. It also managed to win eight seats, a first since the state’s formation. After that, it went on to win eight of the 17 Lok Sabha seats in the 2024 Parliament elections. 

However, the panchayat election results later showed that the party at the grassroots still hasn’t got a strong foothold, so far.

Back-to-back communal incidents

Before anyone accuses me of targeting the Congress or of being a BRS stooge, let me list down a bunch of communal incidents that have transpired since the Congress came to power. I wrote in 2024 of how Hyderabad or the state was reeling from back-to-back communal incidents.

One incident in October 2024 — the desecration of an idol — even led to full-blown violence in Secunderabad, an area which is generally known to be peaceful and cosmopolitan. Apart from that, several shops belonging to Muslims were burnt in Jainoor mandal of Kumaram Bheem-Asifababad district in Telangana in 2024, in retaliation for a Muslim man’s sexual assault and murder attempt on a tribal woman.

Back then, the then Telangana director general of police (DGP) Jitender told The Print that there was “some enthusiasm among some groups.” He said there was no link between those incidents and added that there was nothing to worry about. If only that were true, because since then, things have definitely not gotten better.

In fact, things have evidently gotten worse. All one needs to do is search Google and a list of incidents from Hyderabad about alleged hate crimes pops up. On July 9, a 24-year-old Muslim man was left with serious head injuries after he was attacked by a group of men on Jalpally Road. While the police cited an altercation, the victim, Mohammed Mahboob, said he was targeted because he is Muslim.

Similarly, even last year, right-wing elements attacked Muslim youth and forced them to raise “Jai Shri Ram” slogans on June 10, around midnight, at a hotel under the Raidurgam Police Station limits. In the same year, on April 1, an angry Hindutva mob allegedly assaulted a 60-year-old Muslim man and his teenage son for reportedly selling beef during Hanuman Jayanti in Telangana’s Jagityal district.

The list is long and I can keep going on and on, but I think the point is clear. The Congress in Telangana has failed in controlling the spread of hate. The silence from party leaders is what makes it worse, so I think the central leadership is also partly to blame. You can’t oppose Hindutva on a national level and then allow your own state-level leaders to let it continue unabated.

So, we shouldn’t be surprised if hate and anti-Muslim violence become commonplace in Telangana tomorrow. The blame will squarely be on the Congress and its leadership that chose silence while watching the social fabric burn.