They killed, again, in Modi's India

TT, Hazaribagh, June 29: An occupant of a van transporting meat was lynched not too far from Ranchi this morning in a macabre display of impunity, a few hours before Prime Minister Narendra Modi invoked Mahatma Gandhi in an appeal to end such killings.

Footage showed a man in his forties, wearing blue jeans and a matching shirt, sitting dazed on the ground near a torn sack from which chunks of red meat had spilled out. The van, carrying a Bengal licence plate, was in flames.

What stood out was a throng, mostly made up of men in their teens or early twenties, that formed around the man.

They were gawkers, not participants, taking in the sight unfolding before them in daylight in the heart of a marketplace and in the middle of everyday life.

Hazaribagh, June 29: An occupant of a van transporting meat was lynched not too far from Ranchi this morning in a macabre display of impunity, a few hours before Prime Minister Narendra Modi invoked Mahatma Gandhi in an appeal to end such killings.

Footage showed a man in his forties, wearing blue jeans and a matching shirt, sitting dazed on the ground near a torn sack from which chunks of red meat had spilled out. The van, carrying a Bengal licence plate, was in flames.

What stood out was a throng, mostly made up of men in their teens or early twenties, that formed around the man.

They were gawkers, not participants, taking in the sight unfolding before them in daylight in the heart of a marketplace and in the middle of everyday life.