A temple in Pushkar, India. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday distanced himself from right-wing cow protection groups that have attacked Muslims and others. Credit Himanshu Sharma/Reuters

Source: The New York Times

By ELLEN BARRY

NEW DELHI — As his party prepares for elections in key states, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has distanced himself from right-wing cow protection groups that have proliferated since his government came to power. These vigilante groups have carried out violent attacks on Muslims and, more recently, low-caste Hindus suspected of slaughtering cows, which are considered sacred in Hinduism.

In the most extensive remarks he has made on the vigilante movement, Mr. Modi said on Saturday that the vast majority of the organizations were not legitimate “gau rakshaks,” or Hindu cow protection volunteers, but “antisocial” groups masquerading as such.

“I feel so angry about them,” he said during a televised public forum. “I have seen some people who indulge in antisocial activities for the whole night, but wear the garb of cow protectors during the day.”

He called on state governments to open “dossiers” on the vigilante groups, saying 70 percent to 80 percent of them were antisocial, though he stopped short of calling for legal action against them.

Mr. Modi was not specific about which episodes had inspired his remarks, but his party is trying to contain a political backlash set off by a brutal attack by cow protection vigilantes last month on four Dalits — members of India’s lowest caste — in his home state, Gujarat.

The attack, captured on video that was widely distributed via social media, may complicate his party’s efforts to attract Dalit voters in coming state elections in the states of Punjab and Uttar Pradesh. In Gujarat, where Mr. Modi’s party has had a strong grip on power for years, his successor as chief minister, Anandiben Patel, resigned last week under the shadow of Dalit protests.

Mr. Modi’s comments were notable in part because he had said so little about such violence in the past.

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Almost every religion has their equivalents of ‘holy cows,’ who are given precedence over human rights. This is one of the reasons why the Muslim Times’s has a large collection promoting secularism