Why violence in Leicester has raised questions about India’s polarising politics

Almost a month after a cricket match between India and Pakistan triggered clashes between Hindus and Muslim groups in Leicester, a city often seen as a beacon of multicultural cohesion is reeling from weeks of unrest as community leaders and authorities appeal for calm.

While the scale of the communal violence has been described as “unprecedented” in the UK, local religious groups and community leaders say that tensions had been simmering long before the cricket on 28 August.

Concerns have been raised that the community’s vibrant multicultural character may have been altered forever by the recent violence, which many among the south Asian diaspora in Leicester view as a reflection of the increasingly polarised politics in India.

On 28 August, violence broke out after celebrations involving hundreds of India fans in the Belgrave area and included the chanting of anti-Pakistan slogans.

On 17 September things boiled over when more than 300 Hindu and Muslim men clashed with each other – and police – during two nights of violence that stretched across a swathe of Leicester’s East End.

Masked men in masks and balaclavas were seen chanting Jai Shri Ram (Hail Lord Ram) – a devotional chant that has at times been appropriated by hardliners and used as a war cry.

Subsequently, a group of 100 Muslim men gathered in response to the other community’s march.

The situation took a turn for the worse after social media videos showed a man pulling down a flag outside a Hindu temple, while another video – whose authenticity could not be verified – showed a flag being burnt.

In the ensuing clashes, 25 police officers were injured.

Leicester police said that a total of 47 people had been arrested over the recent disorder, and eight people have been charged with a number of offences, including drunk driving, making threats to kill and possessing an offensive weapon.

Police have also pointed to “proactive” social media use as fuelling the unrest in the city.

“I think the issue of social media has been one of the biggest challenges we’ve had because we know that people are connected nowadays on social media - the speed of that and how things can be disseminated is significant,” Temporary Chief Constable Rob Nixon was quoted as saying to the BBC this weekend.

Members of the community and religious groups in Leicester say that the incidents on the night of 17 September represent an escalation of months-long targeted assaults on minorities.

Speaking to The Independent, the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) said that while social harmony has prevailed in Leicester for over five decades, tensions have escalated in recent months.

“We have spoken to local groups and communities in Leicester who have attributed this escalation in tensions to new groups, who have settled more recently, espousing extreme right-wing Hindutva ideology,” an MCB spokesperson said.

“Tensions have been heightened greatly in the past three months in particular as a result of targeted physical assaults on Muslims and Sikhs and the routine intimidation of Muslims.

“The ongoing antagonism ultimately came to a head on Saturday, 17 September, when over 200 men marched through a largely Muslim and Sikh populated area, chanting inflammatory slogans and intimidating the locals.

“This resulted in a counter march by young Muslim men with tensions reaching unprecedented levels. Faith groups on all sides have since had to step in and call for calm.”

Sunita Viswanath is the executive director of Hindus for Human Rights, a non-profit Hindu group that has chapters in the US, Australia and UK. She says while “Hindutva hatred towards Muslims was the catalyst for the violence in Leicester, there was [also] targeting of Hindus by Muslims”.

“A temple’s flag was removed, and Muslim youth did throw projectiles at police and a temple,” she says to The Independent.

“It is important to denounce this and praise the Muslim religious leaders who did all they could to deescalate the situation.”

Amrit Wilson, a British-Indian author and activist who is also a founding member of the South Asia Solidarity collective working with the community in Leicester, says the unrest after the cricket match was a “signal”.

“Soon after the match we saw calls on social media for an extremely provocative march which was being organised on anti-Hindu hate. It was eventually stopped from taking place but had already been publicised widely both inside and outside Leicester.

“Even then we did not think that things would boil over the way they did on 17 September when people there saw coach loads of people coming from outside wearing gloves and balaclavas to avoid being identified,” she says.

In the statement on 19 September, Leicestershire police said that of those arrested, some had come from Birmingham.

In a statement last week, the Hindu Council of UK condemned the attacks on Hindu places of worship, reported the Press Trust of India.

“We condemn damages to Hindu temples which are a place of worship and should not be disrespected,” the statement said.

On 20 September, leaders of Hindu and Muslim communities gathered on the steps of a mosque to denounce the violence.

A statement signed by groups of the two communities was read out by Pradip Gajjar, president of Iskcon Leicester Hindu temple which said that both faith groups were “saddened and heartbroken to see the eruption of tension and violence”.

Despite appeals for peace and calm, several hardline Hindu groups have continued to claim on social media that the violence was a result of “anti-Hindu sentiment”.

Questions have also been raised against the Indian government led by prime minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

The Indian government felt compelled to issue a statement denouncing the violence and condemned the attack on Hindus, but did not mention Muslims.

The MCB has subsequently written a letter to the Indian High Commission in Britain demanding a “balanced view” that represents the diaspora.

Experts say that the tensions in the diaspora community in Leicester are only a reflection of the politics of religious polarisation back home in India.

“Hindutva ideology is reigning India, and threatening to demolish secular democracy in India, and much of the financial and ideological support for Hindutva comes from the diaspora,” said Ms Viswanath.

India under Mr Modi’s BJP has grown increasingly polarised with rising incidents of attacks against minorities.

In June, the US State Department’s annual report on international religious freedom said that religious minorities in India faced intimidation throughout 2021 and took note of anti-conversion laws, lynchings and civilian killings in Jammu and Kashmir.

Communal tensions have also brewed during sporting contests especially when India plays rival neighbour Pakistan.

Although never gone entirely, tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours have been especially high since a flashpoint of violence in February 2019, which culminated in Pakistan shooting down an Indian fighter jet and capturing its pilot.

Relations have virtually been in a cold storage, especially after India revoked the special status for Jammu and Kashmir in 2019, outraging Pakistan, which also lays claim to the Himalayan region.

These political tensions also manifest themselves in sport.

Last October, after India lost a T20 World Cup fixture to Pakistan, a spate of communal incidents was reported across India including attacks directed at Indian player Mohammad Shami, who is Muslim.

Three Kashmiri students at a college in Uttar Pradesh state were arrested for allegedly cheering for Pakistan and charged with sedition, a colonial era law that critics say is being increasingly used by the Modi government to crack down on dissent.

Observers say that while India-Pakistan cricket matches have involved high tensions even in diaspora communities in the UK, violence has been “rare.”

Long seen as a model multicultural city, the 2011 Census shows that White British (45%) and Indians (28%) are the largest ethnic groups in Leicester city.

The area saw large scale migration from India after the subcontinent was partitioned in 1947 with the end of the British colonial rule.

The remaining population in Leicester is a mix of different ethnic groups including White Other (5%), Asian Other (4%), African (4%) and Pakistani (2%).

In terms of the religious demography, the majority 55 per cent are Christians, according to a UK National Health Service (NHS) report on the “Demographic Profile of Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland.”

The report says that the numbers of Muslims and Hindus are almost the same at 7.4 per cent and 7.2 per cent of the population respectively, followed by Sikhs (2.4%).

Ajay Gudavarthy, associate professor at New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University says that the diaspora was “actively mobilised through Mr Modi’s bid to the top post”.

“VHP [Vishwa Hindu Parishad, an umbrella group of Hindu outfits which is an ally of the BJP] has been active in much of Europe and North America. Diaspora also actively contributes to keep the Sangh Parivar [which includes the BJP, its ideological parent organisation Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh or RSS and other organisations like the VHP, Bajrang Dal among others] cash rich.”

The VHP has held protests across India including outside the British High Commission in Delhi to protest against the attacks on Hindus in Britain.

“Bigotry is not new in diaspora, Mr Modi has only designed a well thought out strategy that connects previous mobilisation to convert effectively into rich electoral dividends,” Mr Gudavarthy says.

“This is also handsomely aided by the military interventions on the other side of the border. As reports suggest, there were masked men from both the communities.”

In the UK, observers say that religious polarisation has been aided by the Tory right which has “befriended” the Modi government.

“Many of us have been anticipating such moves for some years now as the UK Tory right has befriended the Modi government and looked the other way in the face of its attacks on minorities, the courts and journalists in India,” said Mukulika Banerjee, associate professor at London School of Economics and Political Science to The Independent.

“Individual Tory MPs (like Bob Blackman) have explicitly endorsed the nonsensical and groundless idea of Hindu phobia for their own purposes.

“Given the large South Asian population in this country, this is clearly fanning the flames and playing with fire.”

Activists say that while the scale of the violence seen in the last month has been unprecedented, its origins can be traced to the growth of global Hindutva.

“The RSS has been very active in Leicester since the 1990s, indoctrinating people with their ideology,” Ms Wilson said.

“They [RSS] want a world community of Hindus. They have long been saying and their supporters have also spoken about how the Indian government should protect them as Hindus.

“Earlier the role of the diaspora may have been limited to fundraising or coming down heavily on India’s critics outside the country.

“But now it is about provoking conflict and communal violence so that can be used in India to show Hindus as victims and strengthened Hindu phobia.

“This is a political strategy by political actors,” she added.

Observers believe that the outbreak of communal violence in the UK follows similar incidents in other countries.

“I am not surprised that there has been an outbreak of communal violence in the UK. We have seen recent anti-Muslim and anti-Sikh violence by Hindutva-aligned people in the diaspora in Australia and the United States,” says Ms Viswanath.

“Over the many decades, it was being the targets of racism from white British people that united Indians of various religions. As a Hindu Indian who grew up in England in the 70s and 80s, I know that my community was more concerned about racism than inter-religious communal tensions. Today is a very different scenario.”

Authorities in Leicester have assured that the focus will remain on ensuring peace.

Home Secretary Suella Braverman said of the unrest in Leicester, that “disorder and thuggery” will face “the full force of the law” after meeting community leaders and police.

Religious groups have also issued appeals to maintain the community’s multicultural fabric.

“Despite recent events, the communities in Leicester remain resolute in their efforts to maintain this diverse city as a place for all communities to live together, peacufully,” the MCB spokesperson said.

Ms Viswanath says that efforts must be made by Hindus to denounce fascism.

“It is urgent and imperative that reasonable and peaceful Hindus take a stand,” she says.

Analysts say that while multiculturalism helped accommodate diverse cultures, incidents in Leicester show that there is a need to find new paths of coexistence.

“Multiculturalism resulted in communities remaining mutually ghettoised and insular. Incidents in Leicester remind us of the impending need to find new pathways of composite co-existence,” Mr Gudavarthy says.