05, Oct 2015

Anil Sinha, NEW DELHI, Oct 05, 2015, DHNS:
Evidence suggests that Bisara village in UP’s Gautam Buddh Nagar district where a Muslim man was killed for allegedly consuming beef has been radicalised by Hindu fringe elements for some time.
Local residents, however, are silent about it. Bisara and some other villages that are surrounded by industries and markets have a large number of residents, particularly youths, who lack educational qualification, are unemployed and little skilled in adapting to modern social values.
This socio-economic complex makes them vulnerable to communalist and fundamentalist ideas.
There are symbolic evidences, too, about the identity crisis of the local people. When one enters the village where 50-year-old Mohammad Akhlaq was mercilessly killed and his young son beaten up after rumours about their family eating beef spread like wildfire, one sees a huge gate. The entrance was erected recently on the initiative of village head Sanjay Rana, has a statue of Maharana Pratap, the Rajput king riding his favourite horse Chetak, at its top.
The gate symbolises the identity crisis through which the Thakurs (Rajput), the dominant caste of the village, are passing through.