Ramzan Under Siege: India in a World at War

Each year, as Muslims in India fast and gather in prayer, the country braces, not for celebration, but for the familiar rhythm of threats, arrests, and violence

Muslims prepare to break their fast at a mosque in New Delhi during the holy month of Ramzan. Image: Rana Ayyub

You know it is Ramzan in India when calls for genocide against Muslims echo in the capital, New Delhi. As has become the norm, Ramzan this year brought yet another cycle of predictable physical, cultural, and psychological violence against Muslims in India.

Yesterday, a plea was moved in a Delhi court seeking protection against potential violence in Uttam Nagar, a Hindu-dominated society after calls for bloodshed on Eid surfaced. Hindu nationalist leaders have given speeches warning of a ‘Khoon ki Holi’ (blood soaked festival) on Eid after an altercation between the two communities. (https://news.abplive.com/cities/uttam-nagar-tension-ahead-of-eid-families-fear-violence-after-clash-death-khoon-ki-holi-1831763#goog_rewarded)

That such a petition feels necessary is itself a measure of how far the line has shifted in India just before a Muslim religious festival.

In Uttar Pradesh, Muslims gathering for iftaar along the banks of the Ganga were arrested following allegations that they consumed non vegetarian food while eating their iftaar, transforming an act of faith into an act of alleged criminality. According to multiple Indian news publications, “The persons were booked under sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita pertaining to defiling a place of worship with intent to insult the religion of a class, deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of a class by insulting its religious beliefs and promoting enmity between groups.

They were also booked under sections pertaining to public nuisance and using evidence known to be false, The Indian Express reported.” (https://scroll.in/latest/1091440/varanasi-14-muslims-arrested-for-allegedly-eating-chicken-biryani-during-iftar-on-ganga)

The message is unmistakable: even the most intimate expressions of Muslim life are now subject to scrutiny, suspicion, arrest and sanction. Muslims in India are being labeled as criminals just by virtue of observing their faith or wearing markers of faith in public. In Maharashtra, Muslim men were booked for simply using a space in an Electricity board office to offer their evening prayers for five minutes during Ramzan. maharashtra

In Uttarakhand, north India, an elderly Muslim man was subjected to slurs and assaulted by a mob after he was found offering Ramzan prayers in the vicinity of a temple. (https://www.ptinews.com/story/national/u-khand-muslim-man-assaulted-for-offering-namaz-on-vacant-land-in-front-of-temple/3410935)

These are just some of the few reported cases from all over India during Ramzan; they are not the aberration, they are the norm.

None of these violent hate crimes takes place in isolation. Over the past few years, Ramzan has come to mark a grim pattern in India’s public life, a season where hate finds both amplification and impunity. It plays out on the streets, as well as through institutions and culture. The release of films like The Kerala Story 2 feeds into a narrative ecosystem that casts Muslims as perpetual suspects, if not enemies within. In the film, Kerala story, Muslims are accused of hatching a conspiracy to convert Hindu women to Islam, a claim that has been debunked on multiple occasions by fact checkers and official news reports. Yet the film was cleared by the Censor Board of India for release despite its potential to create communal disharmony.

In Mumbai’s Dadar, a suburb with a significant Hindu population, a large poster with images of Bharatiya Janata Party leaders asks citizens to attend a special screening of the film. In another suburb, citizens are seen taking a pledge to boycott Muslims socially and economically after the screening of the film. What was once the language of the fringe now echoes in the mainstream, repeated often enough to acquire the veneer of legitimacy.

Ironically, this is taking place at the same time as India was allegedly pleading with Iran through backdoor diplomacy to clear its consignments stuck in the Strait of Hormuz. Critics have pointed out the stark contradiction: a government that presides over deepening hostility toward Muslims at home continues to rely on Muslim-majority nations abroad for strategic and economic interests.

International observers have begun to take note. Genocide Watch has warned that India shows early indicators associated with societies at risk of mass atrocities. The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, a bipartisan U.S. government body, has gone further, recommending targeted sanctions against the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a Hindu nationalist organization widely seen as the ideological parent of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling party. These are serious assessments, and they reflect a pattern that is now visible beyond India’s borders. These are not conclusions arrived at lightly; they reflect a pattern visible enough to transcend national boundaries.

Yet, within India, there is little introspection. Over the past two weeks, sections of the right wing openly celebrated the deaths of Iranians, Palestinians, and even the reported killing of Ali Khamenei, not as geopolitical events, but as victories defined by the religion of the dead. The dehumanisation is so complete that Muslim lives, anywhere in the world, are rendered expendable.

This makes the Indian government’s foreign policy posture all the more striking. Even as hate intensifies at home, New Delhi continues to rely on Iran for strategic access, at times appearing, critics argue, to stand before Tehran with a begging bowl to ensure passage through the Strait of Hormuz. The contradiction is hard to ignore: hostility domestically, dependence diplomatically.

There is irony, too, in the silence of the Muslim world. Countries like Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, and Qatar have bestowed their highest civilian honours, the March of honours, upon Prime Minister Narendra Modi, even as over 220 million Muslims in India face increasing marginalisation and humiliation. Realpolitik may explain these gestures, but it does not erase their symbolism.

On Instagram and Twitter, influencers share images of food walks and Ramzan evenings at the famous Jama Masjid in Delhi and Mohammed Ali Road in Mumbai. But as one of the iconic shopkeepers near Minara Masjid told me, “They come and eat with us, but when there is a demolition or a hate crime in this very area, they pretend we do not exist.” The shop owner was referring to the demolition of Muslim shops in the area on the occasion of the Ram Temple inauguration in January 2024. He says he is angry but not bitter. Refusing to be named for fear of consequences, he added, “They will still find ‘mohabbat ka sharbat’ (The drink of love) and ‘Irani chai’ in our neighbourhood, and we will welcome them with open arms.” It is 2 a.m. as I speak to him near his shop on Mohammed Ali Road. There is barely space to breathe as locals revel in the food-filled streets, a significant number of them non-Muslims.

What emerges through events in Ramzan is not a series of disconnected events, but a coherent landscape: cultural vilification, economic exclusion, political silence, and global complicity. Ramzan, a month meant for restraint and reflection, has instead become a mirror, reflecting the steady erosion of India’s constitutional promise. All of this is unfolding even as war engulfs parts of the Middle East, with US and Israeli strikes and civilian casualties across Iran and the region. This Ramzan, Muslims have eaten their pre-dawn and post-sunset meals alongside images of children killed in schools and hospitals across Iran, Gaza, and Lebanon.

In that context, what is happening in India does not stand apart; it echoes a wider moment where Muslim lives, across geographies, are being made increasingly vulnerable and dispensable.

As I write this, a news alert lands in my inbox: Muslims in Uttam Nagar, Delhi, have begun packing their bags two days before Eid, fearing violence and bloodshed. This isn’t Gaza; this is the world’s largest democracy, long held up as the nation of Gandhi, a nation of peace. And yet, each year, Muslims in India brace for the worst, even as they pray for peace and serenity during Ramzan. No one should have to choose between faith and safety. And yet, that is the choice many are quietly making in the 21st-century India.