Houses are not being sold to Muslims in Delhi and Mumbai
by CT Nilesh
There is an insurmountable wall of prejudice, suspicion and ignorance that prevents members of the Muslim community from finding an accommodation of their choice in many cities of India. Living together is getting harder for the two communities is getting.
Mumbai (AsiaNews) – Recently in Mumbai a famous Bollywood actor, after paying the earnest money for the purchase of a flat in fashionable locality, the deal was broken when the administrator of the cooperative society came to know that he was a Muslim. The actor, Emrann Hashmi, filed a complaint with the State Minority Commission, that has the statutory duty to defend the rights of minorities. But some political party blame Hashmi. Sanjay Bedia, worker of the BJP(Bharatiya Janata Party),the Hindu Nationalist Party, accuse him of prejudice and has filed a complaint against Hashmi for making offensive statements along communal lines.
The Muslim community in New Delhi says that what happened to Hashmi in Mumbai is a daily occurrence in the capital, a city that is otherwise a melting pot of regional and communal identities.
It is not just average Muslim but even well-placed professionals – engineers, doctors and journalists – can’t find a place in Delhi’s upscale residential colonies.
Old Delhi instead is a stronghold of the Muslim community but also there things are changing. The desire to live among one’s own community is showing up also in the Walled City where Hindu traders have lived for centuries along with Muslims. Many of them are selling houses to Muslims to move out. In situations like this it is difficult to decide who to blame and where the prejudice lies. Like in Hashmi's case it is unclear whether there actually was religious prejudice
.
Whether Hashmi is right or wrong may be irrelevant; but it is significant the large reaction that the case had evoked in a larger context. The problem of religious bias cannot be wished away. What is needed is a constructive, mutually respectful public dialogue.
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