Hindutva Turns Its Heat On Businesses : Myntra Asked To Take Down Leather Products

Countercurrents.org, KalimNews, 13 November, 2015: The Sangh Parivar's cow protection campaign has gone up another level and asked Myntra, one of the top e-commerce sites in India to remove leather products from its catalogue.

A tweet posted from Twitter account @RSS_Org demanded that the government should act against Myntra as it sold shoes made from cow leather.

@RSS_Org is not the official handle of the Sangh Parivar, however the twitter handle is followed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, finance minister Arun Jaitley, Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje, Gujarat chief minister Anandiben Patel, Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Chhattisgarh chief minister Raman Singh.

When contacted by Times of India, Rajesh Padmar, who is in charge of RSS media affairs in Karnataka, said: "@RSS_Org is the Twitter handle of one of our swayamsevaks. The RSS recognises this handle and public opinion expressed there is shared at the @RSSorg Twitter handle, which is the official and verified one (of Sangh). We endorse the tweet by @RSS_Org on Myntra."

Myntra refused to take down the products from its catalogue and responded on twitter saying that the material for the products it sells was imported, implying that cows were not killed in the country for the leather. Myntra also said that the sale of leather products is not illegal in India.

Sangh Parivar is a common name given to affiliated organisations of Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh (RSS). Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) which is the ruling dispensation in India with Narendra Modi as Prime Minister also is part of the Sangh Parivar. Sangh Parivar puts forward a Hindu supremacist ideology (Hindutva), with the ultimate aim of turning India into a Hindu Rashtra (Hindu Nation).

Recently a hysteria has been unleashed by Hindutva forces over beef eating habit of vast majority of Indians. Three people were killed over this hysteria recenlty. Mohammad Aqlaq was lynched to death in Dadri in Uttar Pradesh, on the mere rumour of storing beef in his house, which later turned out to be mutton in forensic examination. Then Noman was beaten to death in the presence of police in Himachal Pradesh over the rumours that he was transporting cows. Lastly Zahid Rasool Bhat of Kashmir was killed in a petrol bomb attack over the rumour of cow slaughter.

Recently, Kerala house was raided by police in New Delhi in blatant violation of the laws, including the federal rights of a state of the union of India , over an allegation that the restaurant in the house was serving beef. Although beef (especially cow meat) is banned in most of the states in India, beef is not banned in Kerala, West Bengal and several North Eastern states.

On 2nd November, a leader of BJP threatened to behead Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah if he “dared to eat beef”. Shivamogga district level leader of the BJP SN Channabasappa also said that he would “play with his (severed) head”. Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had said that he would eat beef if he wished, and that the BJP did not have the right to question him on it.