The alarming rise in instances of targeted assaults, especially involving religious discrimination, has become a tragic reality of our country.
Recently, a Twitter user, Sagar Parekh, shared an incident where he was taken to the police station in Surat, for asking questions about a cancelled Kunal Kamra show. As per his account, he and his friend, who was recording the entire incident, were let go because ‘they had Hindu names’.
A Kunal Kamra show, scheduled at 9 pm at Shree Surti Modhvanik Wadi in Surat on Saturday, was cancelled. According to reports, at around 7 PM, some people came and told the organisers that the show can’t go on. Mahidharpura Police Inspector, P. A. Arya, claimed that the organisers had not taken police permission for the show.
Sagar also mentions this in his account that the show was cancelled ‘because some people from RSS or Bajrang Dal or VHP called the police saying Kunal is anti-Hindu, anti-national and he makes fun of military etc.’
According to his tweets, Sagar asked a man, who was there to shut down the event, why he thinks Kamra is ‘anti-Hindu’? In response to this, the man started asking about Sagar’s surname and religion. Mwanwhile, the entire incident was being recorded by Sagar’s friend.
The man wanted to know whether he and his friend were ‘converted from Islam or Christianity’. When Sagar questioned his line of interrogation, he was taken to the police.
As per Sagar’s account, they were apparently not harmed, just questioned, ‘because they were Hindus’-
While we were talking to the police one of them (he was from VHP) came outside to tell others (who came to support us) that we won’t be harmed because we are Hindus.
Sagar mentioned that a lot of Islamophobic comments were passed during the incident. They were made to delete the video and signed an apology letter to the police.
You can read the entire Twitter thread here.