By Arsheed Ahmad, TwoCircles.net
On the humid morning of June 17, Mohammad Waseem, a rug trader in Mukteshwar – a serene tourist village in Uttarakhand’s Nainital district – stepped out of his rented home, as he did every day, to begin his business. He took a familiar turn down a well-worn road, a path he had walked countless times before. But that day, something felt different – an uneasy premonition he could not shake.
Moments later, Waseem found himself surrounded, brutally beaten and subjected to a level of humiliation he never imagined possible.
“They put a dog collar around my neck and mocked me, calling me ‘katwa mullah’ (a derogatory and offensive slur used in a communal context in India for Muslims). I begged them to stop. I cried. They treated me like I was not even human,” he alleged.
But the attack did not allegedly stop at humiliation only. He said the men used sharp weapons, possibly knives, and left him with deep bruises and visible injury marks on his back.
“They slashed at me with blades. I was in so much pain I thought I might not make it. My body still burns where they cut me,” he said.
He further alleged the assailants tried to set him on fire, but when they could not find petrol or kerosene, they resorted to using sharp weapons instead.
What unfolded, he alleged, was not a random act of street crime but a targeted hate crime. “They found out I was Muslim, and that is when they started beating me. They also snatched the money I had,” he said.
This story was originally published in twocircles.net. Read the full story here.