Lucknow: All Khalid wanted was an orderly line outside his gas agency. What he got instead was communal and public humiliation he says he will not forget.
The owner of a liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) dealership in Uttar Pradesh’s Bulandshahr district was allegedly heckled, abused with communal slurs and forced to apologise on Tuesday, March 24, with his only fault being that he had asked a group of Hindu Raksha Dal (HRD) workers to wait in line like everyone else.
The trouble began with a misunderstanding. With residents of the village scrambling to procure gas cylinders amid fears of a shortage due to the ongoing West Asia war, Khalid had put in place a simple rule – that only those who had pre-booked would receive a cylinder and everyone had to stand in line.
“As per the government’s orders, only those who have booked are receiving a cylinder. Because people think there is a gas shortage, there has been a lot of rush recently. So we told them to form a queue,” Khalid told the media.
One of the HRD members standing in line, apparently unhappy with the arrangement, called their leader Neetu Yadav, who called Khalid and asked him to let his workers skip the queue. When Khalid held his ground, Yadav issued a warning, saying, “I don’t know about this, but I will show you once I come there.”
‘This is a Hindu Rashtra’
In a video that has since gone viral on social media, Yadav, who came to the agency, and his associates are seen surrounding Khalid outside his agency and unleashing a torrent of communal abuse.
“Yeh Hindu Rashtra me rehkar mullagardi karte hai. Pichwade me ghunsdunga mai inki mullagardi. Yeh Bangladesh nahi hai. Yeh salaa humare ghar mein hum pe bhokra hai. Yeh Hindu Rashtra hai (Living in this Hindu nation, they indulge in mullagardi (a derogatory slur for Muslim behaviour). I will shove their ‘mullagardi’ up their backsides. This is not Bangladesh. He is barking at us in our own home),” Yadav can be heard saying.
The workers then forced Khalid outside his shop and demanded a public apology, accusing him of mistreating them.
“They said, ‘This is a Hindu Rashtra, ise hum Bangladeshi nahi banne denge. Tum hamare ghar mein ho aur yeh kar rahe ho (This is a Hindu nation. We will not let this become Bangladesh. You are on our land and doing this),’” Khalid said. “Saari baatein jo unhone kahi, woh aap video mein dekh rahe hoge (Whatever they said, you can hear in the video).”
Under pressure, Khalid was made to fold his hands and repeat after them: “I will never do this again. Everyone is equal and I made a mistake.”
A dealer of 10 years, 24,000 customers
What makes the episode particularly jarring for Khalid is the context. He has been running his LPG agency for a decade, serving roughly 24,000 customers spread across multiple villages in the area. The village itself is roughly 70 per cent Hindu and 30 per cent Muslim, a demographic reality that makes the targeting all the more unexpected for him.
“I was never targeted like this. There has always been a respectful agreement between the two communities,” he said, visibly shaken.
