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“We borrowed money by mortgaging valuables and taking loans from moneylenders at high interest. If we are unable to sell our animals and recover the money, how will we repay our debts?” The feeling of helplessness is all too palpable in the voice of this Muslim trader, who found himself and others like him shut out from Beni Bagh goat market in Varanasi, just a day before Bakrid. According to The Indian Express, the decades-old goat market was sealed by an order of the municipal commissioner, who had earlier granted permission for the traditional animal trade site but revoked it after “receiving complaints related to sanitation and hygiene.”

No prizes for guessing from which quarters these “complaints” would have emanated but there’s a consolation prize for answering this: How long will these rites of humiliation go on, especially in Uttar Pradesh which is due for an assembly election next year?  And, what will the consequences, intended or unintended, end up being?

The Bharatiya Janata Party finds itself in a bit of quandary. It feels it has had enormous success in politically marginalising India’s 140-million strong Muslim community. The so-called ‘Muslim vote-bank’ is no longer key to national power for anyone. Since 2014, the Modi arrangement has meant the systematic exclusion of Muslims from the nation’s collective life. The law-maker, the administrator, the magistrate and the policeman no longer feel obliged to be........

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