By Aliza Noor
The safai-karamcharis (sanitation workers) who pretty much do the heavy lifting of taking the city’s trash out and keeping its streets clean have come under scanner in Uttar Pradesh. Particularly, the poverty-stricken Miya Muslims from Assam—who make up the majority of these workers—are now being targeted by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s ‘Operation Torch’ or Operation ‘Ghuspaithiya.’
Among them is Salma.* Salma is responsible for cleaning and keeping out the garbage in a few apartments in Mahanagar, Lucknow. In the past week, she has woken up with dread. Being summoned to to verify documents is not new for her. But it is the way in which the process has been accompanied by communal remarks that has sparked fears.
“It’s not that we are scared of showing our documents, we are adhering to all rules. But it is remarks by leaders of this government that are demeaning. Here, the MLA came to our basti and outrightly called us Bangladeshi without any proof and threatened us to leave.”
Salma, Muslim worker from Assam to The Quint
What Salma is referring to is this. BJP MLA (Lucknow-North) Neeraj Bora visited her Fazullaganj basti and was seen holding their Aadhar cards on a video and said:
“These Aadhar cards seem fake to me. They are all Ghuspaithiyas and they have been sent from Bangladesh…They don’t know the language, they say they are speaking Axomiya, but they are speaking Bangladeshi and are Rohingya, Ghuspaithiya.” He added that they must leave the place.
But in fact, it was reported last year that it was a BJP youth wing worker arrested for allegedly being involved in forging identity documents and facilitating illegal border crossing for Bangladeshis.
For this ground report, The Quint visited the several settlements in Lucknow where majority of these workers live, mainly Fazullaganj and Daliganj. Muslim migrants from Assam co-exist with jhuggis of migrants from neighbouring cities of UP such as Gonda, Gorakhpur, Bahraich, Sitapur etc.
However, only Miya Muslim migrants have been overtly questioned. In the past few days, the hate accompanying the crackdown has intensified.
Some days ago, this pamphlet by the name of ‘Yogi ki Paati’ was distributed in Hazratganj and Bhoothnath market areas.
This story was originally published in thequint.com. Read the full story here.