Many raise questions about no action against Pala Bishop for hate speech

Thiruvananthapuram: A week after Kerala's Pala Bishop Joseph Kallarangatt's controversial statement allegedly targeting Muslim community, the state government's refusal to initiate a criminal procedure against the Bishop for creating enmity between two communities has triggered a new debate in the state.

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan ruled out the possibility of initiating any legal action against the bishop; instead, he said the government is in an attempt to resolve the issues through dialogue. However, he warned the divisive forces at work with the intention to disturb the communal harmony in the state with strong words.

It is up to everyone to uphold the value of brotherhood between the various religious communities and keep away the forces operating to disturb the communal fabric of the state, he said.

Pala Bishop Joseph Kallarangatt during a Holy Mass read out an epistle in which he coined 'Narcotic Jihad', a relatively new phrase for Kerala people, along the lines of 'Love Jihad', a phrase coined and used widely by the right-wing to oppose Muslim youth marrying non-Muslim women.

Bishop defined Narcotic Jihad as a kind of Jihad used to lure non-Muslim youth into drug addiction. Neither he nor others who backed him have provided any proof to substantiate their claims of the existence of the cases of the kind of Jihad in the state. Though the Bishop did not directly call out Muslims for these crimes, the very term Jihad and the usage of non-Muslims indicate it was aimed at Muslims.

Many people have questioned the absence of any move for punitive action from the government side against the Bishop for his comment that has stirred sufficient opposition. The News Minute has quoted Kaleeswaram Raj, a lawyer practising in the Kerala High Court and the Supreme Court, as saying that there are provisions to book the Bishop under section 153A of the Indian Penal Code (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language etc. and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony).