India mob kills Muslim man for ‘smuggling’ cows
A mob in northern India has beaten a Muslim man to death and injured four others after accusing them of smuggling cows to be slaughtered for beef.
The casualties were caused after the mob chased the truck loaded with five cows and ten bulls and attacked the five men in the vehicle in Sarahan, a village in Himachal Pradesh State, located about 260 kilometers north of the capital, New Delhi.
Local residents said those attacked were all Muslims from neighboring Uttar Pradesh State.
Somya Sambhasivam, an Indian security official, said police have launched a massive manhunt across the troubled region to detain the attackers.
Police are investigating whether the assailants belonged to a Hindu hard-line group which has been accused of carrying out similar attacks in the region over the past weeks.
Last week, Muslim men who were only removing a cow skin came under attack by a furious Hindu mob in Uttar Pradesh. At least two Muslim men were seriously wounded during the violence and are said to be in critical condition.
Indian media outlets said some 500 people armed with iron rods and bamboo sticks had set fire to dozens of shops belonging to Muslims after the incident.
On September 29, Mohammad Akhlaq, a Muslim man, was dragged from his house in the village of Bisada in Uttar Pradesh and beaten to death by about 100 people. The man was killed over rumors that he had eaten beef, a taboo in the Hindu-majority nation.
Akhlaq’s 22-year-old son was also seriously injured in the attack.
Incidents of anti-Muslim violence have fueled concerns as religious intolerance is growing under the Hindu nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The premier has been urged to speak out on the case after colleagues in his party came under increasing pressure for appearing to downplay the crime.
Modi has fallen short of condemning the violence against Muslim and some other religious communities. However, the premier has recently appealed for religious unity, saying the nation would only prosper “when Hindus and Muslims unite and fight” against poverty.
Slaughtering cows is banned in many states of India, where the majority of the population is Hindu.
However, India is also home to a large Muslim population, and a sizeable Christian and Buddhist minorities.
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