End vigilantism

End vigilantism

Moral policing in Uttar Pradesh is a sign of the shrinking space for individual rights.
UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath's terse message to self-styled moral policing groups doesn't seem to be cutting much ice.
What is a matter of even greater concern is that Hindu Yuva Vahini (HYV), an organisation founded by Adityanath himself, is at the centre of controversy. Following attacks on alleged meat eaters or cow killers, `love jihad' has become another bogey that's a convenient cover for vigilante assaults on minorities and on individual rights. Overzealous members of HYV appear to have barged into a private home and dragged out a couple, because they thought it was a case of love jihad in western UP's Meerut district this Tuesday. Rather than taking action against HYV members for infringing on people's personal lives and liberty, police promptly blamed the victims and booked the male victim for obscenity.
A disturbing video of the Meerut incident, widely circulated on social media, shows HYV members forcing their way into a house and in derogating the couple, on the nebulous logic that they were affecting the area's morals. Last week, police disrupted a church event attended by over 100 people, including American tourists, after HYV alleged religious conversion was being carried out in eastern UP's Maharajganj district. HYV members cited as evidence the presence of US nationals, which according to them demonstrated Hindus were being converted to Christianity.
If this is going to be par for the course in UP, it will be eerily similar to the previous government in which criminal elements close to the ruling Samajwadi Party ruled the roost. It is also similar to Left Front-style administration in Bengal where goons associated with the ruling party run a parallel administration. Governments, however, need to uphold the rule of law and clamp down on the thuggery of political operatives and self-styled moral guardians.