Sporting world must challenge India over 2023 Cricket World Cup
Next spring, India is due to hold the most important general election in the nation's history - a contest which will determine whether India continues its downward spiral into bigotry and authoritarianism, or return to the rich pluralistic traditions of its past.
Though the election is not due to be held until April, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's campaign will in effect be launched this coming October, when cricket-mad India hosts the World Cup.
Modi, following in the tradition of other populist leaders, is determined to extract every last drop of political advantage from the sporting event.
We know this because Modi recently ordered the world's largest cricket stadium, where the World Cup's first game is set to be played, renamed after himself. This sent a message that the Indian cricket team represents his own political party - the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) - and not the nation as a whole.
Thus far the international sporting world has not dared to challenge Modi's appropriation of Indian cricket. It's high time it did so
Cricket prides itself on fairness and decency. Yet Modi is not just the nemesis of India's democratic institutions and rule of law. He is also the figurehead of a movement which has launched deadly attacks on India's minorities.
Those who follow events closely speak of possible genocide against India's 200 million Muslims. There's little reason to believe they are being alarmist.
Early signs of genocide
In India, Muslims fear for their future. In many areas they are subject to the arbitrary demolition of their homes and the constant threat of lynch mobs. In eastern Assam, nearly two million have had their citizenship taken from them, leaving them stateless. On Tuesday, an imam was killed as far-right Hindus attacked a mosque on the outskirts of New Delhi. Such attacks are commonplace.
Jammu and Kashmir, under a longstanding Indian military occupation, was stripped of its autonomous status in 2019.
Gregory Stanton, president of Genocide Watch, predicted the 1994 Rwandan genocide five years before it happened. Last year, he said that "the early warning signs of genocide are present in India". Stanton further pointed to similarities between the situation in India and Myanmar before the killings there.
Escalating by the day
The situation is escalating by the day. In Gujarat last month, Muslims protesting the possible demolition of an Islamic shrine were rounded up and publicly flogged.
Indian Christians are under attack. Since May, Hindu nationalist militants have killed over 100 Christians in northeastern Manipur, destroying churches and displacing 50,000 people in a brutal campaign of terror.
This anti-Muslim violence spreads to the cricket field. Indian police arrested Muslims for allegedly supporting the Pakistani cricket team after Pakistan beat India in a T20 World Cup game two years ago. In Indian-occupied Kashmir, criminal cases were filed against students in two medical colleges for celebrating Pakistan's win. Three Kashmiri students were even imprisoned on sedition charges for three months for sending WhatsApp messages in support of Pakistan.
To be fair, India's cricketers behaved well. When the only Muslim player in India's squad, Mohammed Shami, was abused on social media, India's captain Virat Kohli bravely defended him. "Attacking someone over their religion is the most pathetic thing that a human being can do," he said.
