Maa Kali visarjan procession attacked, police claim violence stemmed from a personal scuffle over bike parking
Kolkata, West Bengal, India 
31 October, 2024
Case Summary
On 1st November, violence broke out during a Maa Kali visarjan procession in Kolkata's Rajabazar locality, where Hindu devotees were attacked. BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari shared videos stating that the immersion procession of the Hindu deity was attacked. He criticized the police for failing to protect the procession, sharing videos on social media that showed the incident and calling for immediate deployment of the Central Armed Police Force (CAPF) in the area. Adhikari accused the authorities of "appeasement politics," claiming the Narkeldanga Police neglected their duty to protect Hindu devotees. BJP spokesperson Amit Malviya also said that in Rajabazar, Kolkata, a procession for Maa Kali’s immersion was stone-pelted and assaulted. He added that the Narkeldanga Police failed to intervene and protect the devotees. The following day, Kolkata Police denied any attack had taken place, suggesting the disturbance stemmed from a personal scuffle over bike parking. 'No Kali Puja immersion procession was attacked. The issue was related to the parking of a bike which led to a fight between two individuals and further escalated. However, the police intervened timely and brought the situation under control. The scheduled Kali Puja immersion procession was completed peacefully and without any hindrance,” the Kolkata Police said, in a post on X. However, Adhikari insisted that the police were attempting a cover-up, demanding strict action and accountability for what he saw as a failure to ensure the community's safety.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
The incident in Kolkata's Rajabazar locality, where Hindu devotees were attacked during a Maa Kali visarjan procession has been added to the tracker under the prime category- Attack not resulting in death. Under this, three sub-categories have been selected as per the case details. The first is- Attack on religious procession. The outward celebration and display of religious symbols in an intrinsic part of Hinduism. Religious processions on various festivals are age-old traditions and a way to manifest faith and form a part of the religious practices of Hindus. On several occasions, such religious processions come under attack by non-Hindu mobs, in a manifestation of their animosity towards Hinduism and their practices. The reasons cited for such violent attacks are many and range from crossing a non-Hindu resident-dominated area to playing loud music, crossing from an area where there is a religious structure of another faith etc. The violent attacks are triggered by the outward display of religiosity by Hindus. The attacks are mainly a manifestation of religious supremacist doctrine which believes that idolatry, essentially the Hindu faith, is one that deserves to be annihilated since the very tenets of Hinduism, its practices and traditions are considered a sin in those doctrines. Since these attacks emanate from intrinsic and doctrinal animosity towards Hindus and Hinduism, it is considered a religiously motivated hate crime under this category. The second sub-category selected is- Communal clash. Communal clash is a form of collective violence that involves clashes between groups belonging to different religious identities. For a communal clash between Hindus and non-Hindus to qualify as a religiously motivated hate crime, the trigger of the violence itself would have to be anti-Hindu in essence. For example, if there is a Hindu religious procession that comes under attack from a non-Hindu mob and after the initial attack, Hindus retaliate in self-defence, leading to a communal clash between the two religious communities. While at a later stage, both communities are involved in the clash/violence, the initial trigger of the violence was by the non-Hindu mob against the Hindus and therefore, it could safely be termed as an anti-Hindu violence. Further, the trigger would also have to be religiously motivated. In the cited example, the attack by the non-Hindu mob was against religious processions and therefore, can be concluded to be religiously motivated. In some cases, the trigger may be non-religious, however, it develops into religious violence against Hindus at a later stage. In such cases too, the foundational animosity towards Hindus becomes the motivating factor of the crime and therefore, it would be classified as a religiously motivated hate crime against Hindus under this category. The third sub-category under which this case has been placed is- Attack against Hindu devotees. Hindu devotees are a few of the easiest targets of religiously motivated hate crimes because during the festival/procession/puja etc, for non-Hindus it is easy to profile their victims on the basis of religion. Hindu devotees come under attack on several occasions by individual non-Hindus or mobs of non-Hindus owing to their animosity against Hinduism, its symbols and tradition/practices. There are several instances of Hindu devotees being attacked while they worship in temples or temporary religious structures, during religious processions, doing bhajan/kirtan/puja in their own homes, in the residential society etc. These attacks are perpetrated by non-Hindus primarily because of their animosity towards Hindus and their faith. In some cases, the trigger for the violence may be non-religious, however, there are two elements that make these hate crimes. First, the Hindus who come under attack are attacked violently while indulging in religious activity. Whether they are in a place of worship or not is immaterial to the crime. When individuals are attacked while indulging in religious practices, the attack in itself is a hindrance to their freedom to practice religion and therefore constitutes a hate crime. Secondly, religious supremacist doctrines and ideologies deem religious practices of Hindus to be offensive ab initio since they are considered “sinful” by these ideologies, worthy to be annihilated by force or coercion. Driven by these religious supremacist ideologies and doctrines, the attacks against Hindu devotees stem from intrinsic animosity towards Hinduism. In some cases, the trigger for the violence may be non-religious, however, it develops into a religiously motivated crime during the course of the violence. Since these attacks stem from animosity towards Hindus and Hinduism, they are considered religiously motivated hate crimes under this category. In this instance, there was an attack on a Hindu religious procession. Such attacks are a form of symbolic aggression against the Hindu community that stems from an innate hatred for Hinduism. Given that the fundamental motivation behind these actions is contempt for Hindus and their religion, this instance has been added to the tracker under the following category. It is important to note here that, though videos of the incident were shared on social media, Kolkata police denied the attack on the Kali puja procession and instead suggested that the incident stemmed from a personal scuffle over bike parking. In many such cases, the police deny that the crime committed was in any way motivated by a religious bias or say that there was ‘no communal angle’ to the crime. Several factors are generally at play here. Many a time the police downplay incidents of low-level communal crime because it is their jurisdiction that comes under question. The police also often say that there was ‘no communal angle’ to a crime when there was one because they wish to ensure that owing to the crime already committed, there is no further flare-up in the area. Likewise, the Left media and the leftist elite are also inclined to emphasise this "no communal angle" trope, especially wherever the victim of the crime is a Hindu. However, to determine whether such cases are religiously motivated hate crimes or not, one needs to understand what is a ‘communal angle’ in a crime. When we hear the phrase ‘communal angle’, the instant image that we have in mind is that of what happened during the Delhi Riots. There are crimes where the communal angle is glaringly obvious, like the Delhi Riots, and there are others, where the trigger of the communal crime could be extremely different and even seemingly benign. Take the example of Lotan Nishad for example. In April 2020, Lotan Nishad was sitting at a tea shop in the village at around 9.30 am. While reading the morning newspaper, he got into a verbal confrontation, over the role of Tablighi Jamaat in transmitting the Wuhan Coronavirus, with some people sitting there. Mohammad Sona, who was present there, began assaulting the victim. After some time Sona brought a gun and fired at him from close range. Nishad fell to the ground and started bleeding. He died. Immediately, after a statement by the police, the ‘liberal’ ecosystem began to peddle the ‘no communal angle’ trope. However, only a police statement or a media report, for instance, cannot be enough to determine whether there is a communal angle present in the crime that has been committed. In fact, to determine whether the crime is communal in nature or not, we need to give emphasis to the ground realities. For example, in the case of Rinku Sharma, the Bajrang Dal activist who was mercilessly stabbed in his house in front of his family members in Delhi’s Mangolpuri area in the year 2021, the leftist media and the leftist ecosystem had tried to peddle that there was no communal angle to the crime. Even the police denied that the crime was communal in nature. However, Opindia spoke to several people who are on the ground with the family of Rinku Sharma and we were told that the communal tension in the area is palpable. The family of Rinku Sharma has said that the Muslims of the area held a grudge against Rinku ever since he celebrated the Ram Mandir verdict. Like the case of Rinku Sharma, those cases where even if the police have denied a communal angle or the leftist media have gone on an overdrive to peddle the ‘no communal angle’ trope, the ground reality, like the victim’s family or relative's testimonies, make it clear that there was an obvious religious bias that led to the crime, will be documented in this tracker. In this case, the Hindu religious procession was attacked and some videos showed the same. The presence of visual proof reinforces the credibility of the incident and highlights the severity of hostility faced by Hindu devotees during their religious observances. In fact, even if we were to accept the version of the police that the violence erupted over a parking issues, it is not usual for an entire mob with a distinct religious identity (Muslims) to attack another (Hindus) over trivial issues without religious animosity playing the foundation of the motivation of violence. In many cases, the trigger could be innocuous, however, the violence towards Hindus could be motivated by religious bias. In this case, it is true that the attack against Hindus devotees was initiated by the Muslims during a religious procession. First, an attack on devotees during a religious procession is a hate crime ab initio. Secondly, if the issue indeed was parking, the severity of the violence directed towards Hindus, even if with an innocuous trigger, points towards deep rooted religious animosity leading to violence against devotees - which is why this case has been added to the tracker.
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