On April 14, BBC presents a story which starts with a loaded question ‘why people get away with hate speech in India’

Claim

BBC said: Is it really easy to get away with hate speech in India? A spate of recent incidents in the days leading up to the Hindu festival of Ram Navami on 10 April would suggest so. The festival was marked by incidents of hate speech and even violence in some states.

Counterclaim:

There is a saying: Where there is smoke there is fire. Tension on communal lines started building with Hijab row this year in February. Then all of sudden on April 6, that is four days before the Ram Navami, one of the leading Hindu festivals, a video in which Al-Qaeda Chief Aryaman Al Zawahiri is shown praising Karnataka college student Muskan Khan for defending hijab was released. Before that in the course of assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, provocative statements were given by a leader of one community against another.

This way an atmosphere filled with hatred and detestation was created. The BBC should remember that seeds of religion-based divisions in Indian society were sowed by the British colonial ruler under its’ divide and rule policy after the ‘1857 Mutiny.’ Though the British left the Indian shore in August 1947 and after fathering Pakistan out of India, the communal virus it left behind, continues to remain buried in the psyche of people of the region. Then polarizing contents generated by western media, including the BBC, act like a brew which activates the virus whenever it gets a fertile ground.

Nevertheless, in a planned way communal tension seems to have been stoked in states and Union Territories of India—and all this to defame the country. For example, as per media reports, stones and glass bottles were found on rooftops of the houses of the street of Delhi’s Jahangirpuri area where riots broke out after a religious procession on April 16 was hit by stones. Several people, including police personnel were injured, and vehicles were burnt down by rioters during the incident. Delhi Police has so far arrested 23 people and of them eight have their criminal pasts from whom three firearms and 5 swords have been recovered. One Mohammad Aslam who has been arrested was suspected to be involved in firing on a Delhi Police ASI who is currently nursing his wounds at a hospital in the national capital. Aslam was allegedly also involved in 2020 Delhi riots in which more than 50 people were killed.

As for hate speeches, it should be remembered that those who have indulged in speaking on communal lines or have used the language of threat against a community, they have been arrested. FIRs have been filed against people for allegedly making hate speeches during an event in Haridwar in Uttar Pradesh in 2021. With this, there is also a cruel fact that Akbaruddin Owaisi, AIMIM MLA, who was recently acquitted by a court on account of lack of evidence to hate speeches he allegedly delivered in 2012 in Telangana, on April 18, allegedly termed participants of the religious procession on Ram Navami in Delhi’s Jahingirpuri as “saffron terrorist”. Unfortunate part of religious divide in the country is that people from both Hindu and Muslim communities suffer a lot. Yet incidents of communal strife have increased and it is suspected that ISIS or any other international organisations would be involved to create disharmony and disbalance the social structure of India. In this regard, a PIL has been filed in the Supreme Court, urging the top court to probe possible links of ISIS or other international organisations in one after another communal strife in the country. In the past one-week, communal clashes broke out in five Indian states like Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, Rajasthan and West Bengal during the celebrations of Ram Navami, the festival that marks the birth of Lord Ram.

Read details in NDTV:

https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/ram-navami-communal-clashes-delhi-violence-cases-reach-supreme-court-2896553

Claim:

BBC said the scale of the problem has accelerated in recent years, with Indians being regularly bombarded with hateful speech and polarising content. With social media and TV channels amplifying remarks and tweets even by minor politicians - many of whom find it the easiest way to make headlines - the hateful rhetoric seems "pervasive" and "non-stop".

Counterclaim:

The British broadcaster, it seems, is making a sweeping statement. As of June 2021, there were 915 television channels and more than 1,44,000 newspapers and periodicals in India. Not all would carry polarising contents, given that news outlets like NDTV or portals like Wire, Scroll, The Print and Quint and dailies like Indian Express are known for giving sharp anti-establishment contents.