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Swati Goel Sharma

@swati_gs

Dec 16

This week, I visited a colony in Ghaziabad where a conversion racket was being run in an all-Hindu area by a teacher from a local well-known missionary school with help of a government employee

Here’s what I found 🧵

The colony, Sewa Nagar, is home to 2,000 people from castes like Pal (gadaria), Valmiki, Jatav and Brahmin

There is a house called ‘Om Niwas’ owned by late Jagpal Singh Jatav. On ground floor lives his younger son Akash while on first floor lives his elder son Ravi

Ravi, a govt employee, converted to Christianity 2 years ago

On 23 Sept, police raided the first-floor of this house and found 150 people in a Yeshu Prarthana sabha (see video)

On complaint by an activist named Navin, Nandgram police filed an FIR against Ravi, Gerald Mathew Masih and three others

Police said they were found to be converting people “through false promises of medical healing through miracles and by luring them through money” (see press note)

Read 10 tweets

Swati Goel Sharma

@swati_gs

Dec 9

Another mass conversion racket busted in Meerut, West UP

If you recall, I reported on a similar incident from Meerut recently, followed by a yajna to bring families back to Sanatana fold

Latest one had been allegedly operational for 10 years

A thread on what was uncovered🧵

Raid took place in Shankar Colony, Partapur area

On receiving a tip-off, activists and police entered a home and found its second floor converted into a fully functional church called ‘Masihi Prarthana Church’

Over 50 men and women were attending a Bible-reading session

Locals told me the setup had been operational for more than 10 years and had become more sophisticated with time

They said they had been grudgingly tolerating these Sunday gatherings in their colony because for years, complaints were not entertained

Video of the team entering the house:

Read 7 tweets

Swati Goel Sharma

@swati_gs

Dec 6

Exactly 32 years ago, on 6 Dec 1992, a dhancha built during Babur’s invasion over a site widely believed to be Shri Ram’s birthplace was brought down with bare hands by thousands of karsevaks in Ayodhya

What really unfolded that day as seen through a core karsevak’s eyes? A 🧵

That day, karsevaks dismantled the dhancha (structure) using their hands and simple tools. In Ayodhya, locals and Sangh members dislike calling it ‘Babri’ or ‘mosque’ and refer to it simply as dhancha

Once the structure fell, chaos ensued. Some even lost their lives. Many were injured

By next morning, karsevaks started clearing the debris

A message was sent out to treat every rock and brick as prasad. Some broke bricks to share, others took mud. Within two hours, the site was cleared

By evening, the site was leveled. Then, a temporary temple was built with a cement platform, bamboo sticks and cloth. Ram Lalla was enshrined there

And it is at this very spot where he sits even today

The man sharing this account is Bholendra who joined the movement after police firing on Ram bhakts in Ayodhya in 1990, killing over 50. Kothari brothers from Kolkata were among those killed (video attached)

He told me: “It felt like Jallianwala Bagh. But was even more disturbing as it happened after independence and that too in the land of Lord Ram”

Drawn to Ayodhya, Bholendra joined VHP

In this video, he shares how he was tasked with creating a tent city for an estimated 4 lakh karsevaks ahead of 6 Dec and how the team divided the tent city into Poorvanchal, Pashchimanchal, Madhyanchal, Uttaranchal, and Dakshinanchal based on region, language and food habits

Tent colonies sprang up around the Ram Janmabhoomi area with names like Shivaji Nagar, Shankaracharya Nagar and Rani Lakshmibai Nagar (for women)

Volunteers transported arrivals from railway stations and bus stands directly to their camps

Read 6 tweets

Swati Goel Sharma

@swati_gs

Dec 1

14 Hindus were burnt alive in a mill very near to Sambhal’s disputed mosque in 1978

Rumours of a Hindu killing an imam and a sadhu performing puja there triggered this massacre

I spoke to the family of the mill owner, who was also killed

A thread on this forgotten tragedy 🧵

The mill, an ahaata spread over 4 beegha in Nakhasa Bazaar, belonged to Banwari Lal Goel, an affluent, well-respected man in Sambhal

He was known for his fairness and even Muslim families sought his help to resolve disputes, locals recall. He was also Sambhal president of VHP

On 29 March 1978, when Muslim League leader Manzar Shafi’s followers unleashed violence (check my previous thread on it), Banwari Lal was in the compound

His workers and their relatives sought refuge in his compound, believing his stature would protect them

They were wrong

Read 12 tweets

Swati Goel Sharma

@swati_gs

Nov 30

Those wondering if Hindus of #Sambhal have made no efforts to sustain their claim on the disputed mosque site which they have always known as Shri Hari Har Mandir, well they did

But it stopped after a 1978 pogrom, where 23 of 25 officially recorded dead were Hindus

A thread 🧵

1. Sambhal has witnessed recurring communal violence, major ones being 1935, 1947 partition, and the horrific 1978 pogrom

In 1978, Hindus in Moradabad district made up less than 30%. The violence that year began on 29 March 1978 when Vinod Pramod, a Hindu paan shop owner, defied a Muslim League leader’s bandh call

That leader was Mohd Manzar Shafi and had recently got bail in a communal violence case two years earlier where one Muslim and three Hindus were allegedly killed

Shafi’s men unleashed violence. Academic accounts describe Sambhal as turning into a “virtual crematorium”

2. Today, locals tell me the immediate trigger was not just defiance but also a false rumour: that a Hindu man had killed a Muslim inside the mosque

Sanjay Gupta, 60, who lives near the disputed structure, tells me the property had long been a flashpoint between the communities

Gupta, who was 14 then, recalls his parents saying that yet another rumour floated that a sadhu was allegedly circling the site and trying to offer jal outside a locked room inside the mosque

Read 8 tweets

Swati Goel Sharma

@swati_gs

Nov 27

Yesterday I visited Sambhal, where heavy stone-pelting erupted on Sunday during a court-ordered survey of a disputed mosque structure

To my surprise, every Hindu local - minorities in Sambhal - referred to the property as ‘Shri Hari Har Temple’

Here is what I found. A thread 🧵

First, a bit about the area

The mosque, known as Shahi Jama Masjid Sambhal, is located in Kot area of Sambhal in Uttar Pradesh. Hindus and Muslims refer to their respective colonies as Kot Purvi (East) and Kot Gharbhi (Gharab is West in Arabic).

The street outside the mosque’s front gate (seen in video) is largely Hindu-populated and leads to a police chowki. Locals jokingly call this street - Post office road - as India-Pakistan border

2011 census put Hindu population in Sambhal at 22%. In Kot, Hindus said they are no more than 10%

Anil Tandon, aged 66 and a lifelong resident of Kot Purvi, said his family always referred to the property as Hari Har Temple

Jama Masjid was a recent construction and it used to be Hari Har temple temple before, his family would say

When Anil was 8, he visited the site with relatives, who wished to see the temple inside the mosque as it was always quite a subject of discussion

Back then, Hindus could still enter the premises as mosque side had not yet created gigantic walls like today. Inside, he recalls a room that was locked (more on this later in the thread). And a water ‘kund’