There’s resistance in a state where a saffron scarf is a licence to assault — or even kill. Where a complaint from a BJP functionary is enough to get a headmaster suspended. Where universities prevent students from entering their own campuses but unnumbered vehicles bearing armed Hindutva hoodlums can roll in unchecked. Where Muslims can be arrested for offering Friday prayers inside a vacant house, even with permission.

There’s resistance in the state where Muslims are arrested for the slightest whiff of criticism in their social media posts. Call it the ‘Mohammad Deepak effect’, or call it the Allahabad High Court effect, reports coming in from Mathura, Allahabad, Varanasi — even Jaipur — suggest that the people are pushing back.

In a primary school in Mathura, headmaster Jan Mohammad has been reinstated — but only after the village panchayat of 20,000 people took to the streets. Locals rose above caste and religion and stood up to the ruling party’s MLA and his associates. Teachers protested, students rallied behind their headmaster, and over 300 villagers went to meet the district magistrate. A former MLA testified in his support.

Only then did the administration relent. The children say their headmaster is excellent, fair and just. But in the eyes of a BJP leader, the integrity of this Muslim — who had spent 12 years in the paramilitary forces — had become intolerable.

Shyamsundar Sharma, eight-time former MLA from Mant in Mathura district, says that during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR), Jan Mohammad served as a booth-level officer. Sharma alleges that BJP legislator Rajesh Chaudhary handed Jan Mohammad a list of voters. When Jan Mohammad refused to delete any names, the MLA allegedly threatened him: “You better watch out.”

Jan Mohammad reportedly replied, “Either way I’m dead, so why not die doing the right thing?” Soon after, Durgesh Pradhan, BJP president of Bajna mandal of Mant and resident of Nausherpur, filed a complaint against him.

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The complaint alleged that at Nohjheel Primary School No. 1 — where........

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