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When the COVID-19 virus was being reported across India, much of the anger was directed towards a prayer event held by Tablighi Jamaat, an orthodox Muslim congregation, at its headquarters in New Delhi’s Nizamuddin. As the Hindu right wing and TV channels went ballistic blaming the Tablighi Jamaat for spreading the virus across the country, the bigotry played out in Karnataka too. Many BJP leaders in the state competed with each other to target the Tablighi Jamaat and through it, the entire Muslim community.
Udupi-Chikkamagaluru MP Shobha Karandlaje led the charge, claiming that Tablighi Jamaat members not reporting their travel history to the government was equal to ‘corona jihad’. MLA Renukacharya demanded that the Jamaat delegates be shot down. Mahadevapura MLA Arvind Limbavali wanted Jamaat members who didn’t take COVID-19 tests to be jailed. The then Home Minister and current Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai said that the Jamaat members will be tracked using their mobile phones and those who have entered the state will be forced into quarantine. Bommai also said that those who are yet to arrive in Karnataka will be taken into quarantine from the railway stations.
The flurry of hateful comments did not stop despite the then chief minister BS Yediyurappa calling them irresponsible. Yediyurappa also called for a meeting of Muslim legislators and leaders asking them to convince the community that there was no intention to alienate, but the government merely wanted them to report infections.
But it wasn’t just politicians. Many Kannada TV channels too played their part in spreading hatred. News 18 Kannada and Suvarna TV were later fined by the News Broadcasting Standards Authority (NBSA) for racial and religious stereotyping and inciting communal tension. A complaint filed by a group named ‘Hate Speech Beda’ noted that Suvarna TV showed the video of a young Muslim man wiping his nose with a currency note and said that “corona criminals have been exposed.” The anchor also said that “these people are more dangerous than the coronavirus” and “corona is a god given donation for such people.” The anchor also referred to Muslims as ‘these devils’.
In the first week of April 2020, three Muslim men were attacked with sticks and iron rods in Rabkavi Banahatti taluk of Bagalkot district, with the attackers accusing them of spreading the virus. An over eight-minute long video of the incident that went viral showed a mob of 10-15 persons surrounding the three victims. Other instances of attacks on Muslims and mosques were reported in the state during this period.
As the number of infections increased over the country, channels and right wingers could no longer blame the Jamaat and the focus shifted. However, a year later, on May 4, 2021, young BJP MP Tejasvi Surya once again found a way of communalising the pandemic. Flanked by BJP MLAs, he stormed into a COVID-19 war room run by the Bengaluru city corporation or BBMP (Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike) and blamed 16 Muslims out of the 220 odd staff members for a ‘faulty system’. “Is this a madrasa?” Tejasvi’s uncle and MLA Ravi Subramanya asked. They called it ‘bed jihad’, accusing the Muslim employees of blocking beds for their family and friends and also of ‘selling’ them.
A few months later, a video of a vendor spitting into a food packet while he was packing it, was forwarded across Bengaluru. The vendor was wearing a skull cap and the video was used to convince the public to boycott buying food from Muslim vendors and restaurants. Text messages accompanying the video claimed that this was a conspiracy to spread coronavirus through saliva. This was done at a time when dining at restaurants was not allowed and only takeaway was permitted as per the lockdown guidelines.
Besides the above incidents, the pandemic was communalised also using WhatsApp forwards that blamed Muslims and their practices for the spread of the virus. These propaganda messages also included those linking the Brahmanical beliefs and practices connected to ‘purity’ and ‘impurity’ as the reason why the virus would not affect those practising it.