NEW DELHI: Indian police said on Thursday they were compiling lists of right-wing Hindu “cow vigilantes” after a young man falsely accused of beef smuggling was shot dead.
The murder last month of 19-year-old Aryan Mishra in the northern state of Haryana has sparked unusual outrage, largely because the young man was Hindu.
Cows are revered as sacred by the country's Hindu majority, and their slaughter is illegal in many Indian states.
Authorities are often accused of failing to control Hindu radicals, who form gangs of “cow vigilantes” to attack people accused of involvement in cattle slaughter, with several reported deaths each year.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has in the past condemned attacks on cattle traders and meat eaters, but critics say extremists have been emboldened by the Hindu nationalist rhetoric of his ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Many of those accused of transporting or killing cows are from India's 220 million-strong Muslim community, and social media is filled with videos boasting of vigilante attacks.
Mishra was killed on a highway on August 24 after an armed mob chased his car for 50 kilometres (31 miles), believing he was transporting beef.
Five people have been arrested in connection with the murder, and senior Haryana police officer Aman Yadav said the force was preparing a “cow vigilante list” to track their movements.
'Almost normalized'
The recent attacks have raised fears of rising violence against minorities and a broader debate over religious intolerance.
“When vigilantes are given a free hand by the authorities, tragedies like the one in Haryana are just waiting to happen,” the Times of India wrote in its editorial on Thursday, warning that “in the last decade, cow vigilantism has become almost normal.”
Earlier this week, a 72-year-old Muslim man was beaten on a train after being accused of transporting beef.
Last month, a Muslim waste picker was lynched by a mob in Haryana on suspicion of eating beef.
He Times of India He said it was “revealing” that the shock over Mishra's killing “centred on the fact that he, a Hindu, was wrongly targeted”.
“It is equally revealing that vigilantism […] “This does not provoke outrage in society, let alone coherent and rapid police action,” he added. “But the police and the authorities should be very scared.”
