Hindutwa Extremists has come up with a violent hatred against FabIndia, one of the renowned and leading clothing brands of India. It has hundreds of showrooms across the country however, last week for advertising the latest seasonal collection for Diwali, it has been confronting severe hatred from Hindu Nationalists.
The company has have used Urdu words for advertising purposes, the text used in the advertisement read as ‘Jashn-e-Rivaaz’. The word ‘Jashn’ means ‘celebration’ and ‘Rivaaz’ means ‘Tradition’ in Urdu. Hence the phrase translates as ‘A Celebration of Tradition’.
However, a young parliamentarian of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Tajasvi Surya who is in highlights cause of his Islamophobic remarks, was not happy with it. He tweeted on social media, “Deepavali is not Jashn-e-Riwaaz”, where Deepavali is the traditional name of Diwali.
Moreover, many other leaders from BJP and Hindu Nationalists have also started accusing and harassing FabIndia of hurting the religious sentiments of Hindus.
Furthermore, Nivedita Menon from Jawaharlal Nehru University at New Delhi told Al Jazeera that, “The Hindutva project sees Urdu as a ‘Muslim’ language. And invisibilizing Urdu is part of the larger project of marginalizing the Muslim community, in fact, physically eliminating it.”
Author: Qurratulain Tahir