A Murder that Every Indian Saw

“Ek din aisa kaam karunga ki duniya mujhe yaad rakhegi [One day I’ll do something that the world will remember me by].” Shambulal Regar, one of the most infamous persons in India today, said this to a friend around a year-and-a-half ago.

Coming from a person who had suffered a string of business losses, was burried under debt, and couldn’t stay sober for long, the idea sounded slightly fanciful to his friend. It sounded like the routine desire that people voice at least once in their lifetimes. But it did not, to Chandulal (name changed), sound anything like a pledge.

Having brutally murdered a Muslim for his religion and recorded it on a widely shared video a fortnight ago, Shambhulal has since the last fortnight not only created a name for himself, he has created a communal fissure in Rajasthan the likes of which the state hasn’t seen in decades.

Protest marches by Muslims and counter protest marches by far right Hindu groups have been held in immediate succession, violently in the latter case. Reactionary Hindu protests have broken out in various cities across Rajasthan, including Kota, Udaipur, Bhilwara and in the state capital Jaipur.

With state assembly elections only a few months away, more such marches are being planned. Social campaigns are busy mobilising people in Regar’s name.

Some political Hindu outfits have meanwhile promised to take care of the educational expenses of Regar’s children, others have assured his family free rations and groceries for a year. Those close to Regar’s family say that privately some lawyers have also volunteered to fight Regar’s case pro bono. And there are already strong rumours that Regar will fight as an independent candidate in the assembly elections, from jail.

“Ye chunaavi varsh hai. Agar chunaav jeetna hai to Hindutva ko laana hi hoga aur Hindutva ko leke aaye to Shambhu ke samarthan mein utarna hi hoga [This is an election year. If we have to win the elections we will have to bring in Hindutva and if we do that then we will have to support Shambhulal Regar],” said a senior member of Bajrang Sena, a right wing Hindu group.

I have spent 8 years with him. Not once have I seen him angry. He loved children.

No one in Rajsamand knows for sure why the mild-mannered, easy-go-lucky, yoga practicing, father of three, brutally murdered a Muslim migrant labourer on video.

“I have spent 8 years with him. Not once have I seen him angry. He loved children. He would never allow anyone to raise their hand at a child nor shout at them. For the last few years he would go to the nearby lake and practice Yoga, taking the kids along. They loved him,” said Sohan a friend.

Shambhulal had tattooed his daughter, suffering from a mental illness, holding the globe, on his chest. His brother Lokesh points to the tattoo as a proof of Shambhulal’s love for children.

So what turned him into the dreadful killer?

His friends claim Shambhulal was under threat from the Muslim labourer from whom he ‘rescued’ a Hindu girl. They also point out that he was in a debt of Rs 2 lakh, which is not a small amount for someone like him who came from a poor Dalit family, all of whose 15 members lived in a very small house in a very humble locality.

Some other things about him stand out. For instance, the fact that Shambhulal was quite ambitious.

Rajsamand and other small towns around Udaipur have made name for themselves from the flourishing marble business. Regar too wanted to get rich trading in marble. So he went first to Gurgaon, 15 years ago, where his business partner duped him and then to Anand, Gujarat, where again he lost all his money. Chandulal, his friend and disciple, followed him everywhere.

Shambhulal also was a spendthrift.

“He wanted to enjoy himself. So we went to all the big cities. We also went to Delhi and visited the good bars there. Shambhuji always used to say ‘enjoy yourself because you only live once’.”

Both eventually got tired and bored of their lifestyles. They returned to Rajsamand where Shambhulal tried to get a loan to start a new business. No bank approved. All this while his creditors were closing in. So Shambhu decided to sell a property in his mother’s name.

He said that he didn’t trust any of the existing Hindu outfits. He wanted to do something ‘independently’.

He was quite hungry for fame.

Chandulal, to whom Regar boasted of doing something big, was the one who first introduced Regar to social media. “It was about one and a half years ago. Internet prices had dropped quite drastically. We used to spend most of our time watching videos on the internet. On Shambhuji’s request I opened his Facebook account, showed him how to browse Youtube and connected him with WhatsApp.”

Chandulal began working at his brother’s furniture shop, but just like Shambhulal, felt restless all the time.

“So it happened one fine day. I asked Shambhuji, who is also my guru, what do you think will we do in our lives? We are nobodies in this world, coming from a place whose name many haven’t heard. That’s when he talked about doing something memorable and look how the world knows him now,” Chandulal said beaming with pride.

At the same time he was warming up to the idea of Hindutva.

“Some time after he started watching different videos, and he was mostly interested in news, he began talking about Hindutva. He didn’t talk much except saying that we have to do something about it soon. He also said that he didn’t trust any of the existing Hindu outfits. He wanted to do something ‘independently’.”

It didn’t take him long. On the morning of December 6 — a day that is celebrated by extremist Hindu groups to commemorate the demolition of Babri Masjid — sometime between 11:30 and 12, Shambhulal Regar brutally murdered Afrazul. His 13 years old nephew recorded the entire episode on phone.

According to a senior police officer, Regar arrived at the spot a day earlier with his nephew to rehearse the sequence. His family members say that both had wholesome dinner the previous night, the usual breakfast on the fateful morning, between which both slept peacefully. After his arrest, Regar went on to claim that he killed the wrong Muslim. According to some friends he expressed remorse on finding out the actual identity of his victim.

While the body of his victim — Mohammed Afrazaul — was still smouldering, the video of the murder started appearing on local Rajsamand WhatsApp groups. The motive of the murder wasn’t immediately clear. By evening local television channels started showing a blurred footage of the video. Few hours later other videos, in which Regar talked about his motives, also appeared. The brutal murder turned out to be a communal hate crime. The WhatsApp videos spread like a wildfire throughout the country. Both Shambhulal Regar and Rajsamand gained instant and widespread notoriety.

He has awakened the sleeping Hindutva in us.

Among many far right Hindu groups he’s since become a legend for some. A bit like Mumtaz Qadri, who after shooting down the man he was supposed to protect — Salmaan Taseer — became a hero for Pakistan’s Islamists.

Extremist outfits like Bajrang Dal have been taking out protest marches in his support, songs have been composed in his praise, people have replaced their own display pictures on social media with those of Shambhulal.

A BJP state office bearer, who did not want to be named, boasted about having swapped his WhatsApp display picture with that of Shambhulal’s.

Shambhulal’s friends, many of who were rounded up by police and interrogated for days, express themselves on condition of anonymity. “Usne hamare andar sote hue Hindutva ko jagaya hai [He has awakened the sleeping Hindutva in us],” said Bhupesh [name changed], going on to peddle conspiracy theories like ‘Love Jihad’, ‘Land Jihad’ and so on.

At what time did they find out these phenomena?

“Only recently.” After this he refused to entertain the subject anymore.

Another friend of Shambhulal (contrary to the popular belief he seemed to be very friendly and quite social) said this about his friend: “Humko to garv hai uspe. Ismein koi sharm ki baat nahi. Love jihad ka matter hai. Hamare mohalle mein hi agar ek do case hai to socho pure Bharat mein kitne case honge. Unke pure samaj mein dar bitha diya hai usne. Ye ek chetaavani hai. [We’re proud of him. What’s there to be ashamed of? It’s an issue of ‘Love Jihad’. If there have been a couple of cases in our street, imagine how many cases must there be in the whole country. Their community is scared now. This [murder] is a warning].”

In many ways Shambhulal Regar, about whom the latest rumours are that he will fight as an independent candidate from Rajsamand in the upcoming Assembly polls, has achieved a lot by murdering Afrazul and sharing the video footage widely.

People in Rajsamand who had never seen communal clashes or curfew for the last at least 10 years are now looking at each other with suspicion. These communal tensions are only likely to increase in the coming months.

Consider the sequence of events.

December 8: Two days after the gruesome murder of Mohammed Afrazul, on a Friday afternoon Muslims in Udaipur carried out a huge protest rally. Thousands of Muslim marched down to the collector’s office demanding their safety. Some of them allegedly also shouted communal slogans. Although some participants of that rally claim that these slogans were never really uttered, that this was a malicious video editing job.

December 13: Several Hindu outfits held a rally in Udaipur against the December 8 march, ostensibly to protest against communal slogans uttered there. But they in turn shouted communal slogans and slogans in support of the murderer. Minutes later, the protestors turned violent and started throwing stones at policemen, injuring over 30 of them. They also planted a saffron flag on Udaipur district court. Authorities responded by imposing section 144 in Rajsamand and Udaipur prohibiting large gatherings. Internet was also suspended in both the districts. Over 200 members from various Hindu outfits were arrested.

December 15: More protests were held, this time under the banner of an affiliate of the RSS. The protestors demanded the release of those arrested by police a day earlier. And also demanded that those who participated in December 8 rally be arrested.

Protests led by various Hindu outfits also broke out in several other cities across Rajasthan, in Kota, Jaipur, Kakroli, Bhilwara and Bhinder.

Over 100 of those arrested a day earlier were released and 10 participants of the December 8 rally were arrested.

Till this day, outfits like VHP, Bajrang Dal and Bajrang Sena continue to hold protest marches across the state.

A leader of Bajrang Sena spoke on condition of anonymity. “If you ask me on record, I will condemn the murder. But let’s not forget this is an election year. If we have to win this one, we’ll have to talk of Hindutva and if we talk of Hindutva we’ll have to come out in support of Shambhu.”

He went on to explain how this cycle, beginning from the murder of Afrazul would continue to go on for next several weeks.

“We know that some organisations interested in Dalit-Muslim unity are interested in holding more peace marches in Rajasthan. In their rallies they’re bound to say something that we find objectionable, against which we will hold our own counter protest marches.”

What if the Muslims kept quiet all this while? What if they stopped going out for marches?

“Well then we would quietly do our work, of supporting Shambhu’s family, of talking about love jihad in Rajsamand and Udaipur, and the message would travel across the state anyways. You see Mewar is very important to us.”

The truth is, BJP is facing a lot of hostility from the communities whose support it till now enjoyed.

A senior member of another prominent RSS affiliated outfit VHP talked very briefly about the state’s politics. “There is a lot of resentment against the BJP about the manner in which things have turned out over the last few days. We held a meeting with members of other groups in Udaipur on the 16^th and almost everyone present there condemned the party. The truth is, it is facing a lot of hostility from the communities whose support it till now enjoyed.”

He elaborated, “The Rajputs are angry at them because of the Anandpal encounter case. Brahmins are angry at them because they sidelined a lot of their leaders. The Chief Minister isn’t accessible to anyone. And the traders are unhappy with the highhandedness of the administration. If BJP is to prevent the flip-flop of governments as it alternates between BJP and Congress, it really needs to bind all the Hindus together. And time is running out.”

Over the past few months outfits like Bajrang Sena and others like it have been cropping up with alarming frequency. Many of these outfits ran a campaign against the Bollywood movie Padmavati, in which they raised objections against the proximity shown between the queen and Allahuddin Khilji.

According to one estimate, by a local journalist, there are around 150 such active outfits in Udaipur alone. Udaipur is an important hub for any political movement in Rajasthan because it is the defacto headquarters of Mewar. And as far as elections go, Mewar is believed to be the bellwether of Rajasthan.

And all of a sudden communally sensitive cases and controversies are breaking out all across Udaipur and Mewar. Apart from the murder committed by Shambhulal Regar and the bloody clashes between fringe Hindu groups and police, low level clashes and tensions have simmered in this area for some time now.

In the last fortnight alone, several cases have been reported from Rajsamand and its adjoining areas.

On December 15^, one case of ‘Love Jihad’ was reported. VHP and other Hindu outfits rushed to Kakroli police station to ‘rescue’ a girl who seemed to have been abducted by a Muslim man. The girl later told the police, in front of this reporter, that she was being harassed and wanted to marry the man of her own choice.

One day later, head of a calf was found near a temple in Rajsamand. But police acted swiftly before tensions could break out.

Communal tensions have also started simmering in Bhilwara after idols of Hanuman were placed on an encroached land in the area the district shares with Rajsamand. Business was shut down and curfew was placed again on Tuesday after protestors clashed with police.

The SP of Rajsamand, Manoj Chaudhary, admits that areas in and around Rajsamand are communal sensitive and it doesn’t take much to stoke fires here.

“Yes, in this area we have a serious law and order situation as far as communal tensions are concerned. Though the last serious communal pent up happened way back in 2000-01, this areas has increasingly, over time, begun showing signs of communal stress. This is why for us the Shambhulal Regar case was very important. Had we not nabbed him from his hideout within 24 hours, situations could have deteriorated quite drastically here.”

Shambhulal was not a freedom fighter. Why have people begun worshipping him?

While the police doesn’t admit it, journalists claim that last one year has seen a severe increase of communal clashes across Mewar — Chittorgarh, Rajsamand, Udaipur, Dungarpur, Banswara and especially Bhilwara.

“Almost on a weekly basis we hear reports from Bhilwara and Chittorgarh, and to an extent from Banswara, about non-fatal communal clashes there. But because these places are relatively inaccessible we don’t hear many stories about them.”

Some workers from within the BJP have started speaking out against the communalisation of the otherwise peaceful culture of Mewar.

This is what Tanveer, the head of BJP-run Mewar Kshatriya Mahasabha, had to say about the recent developments:

“Baarud ke dher pe bitha diya hai hame. Kaunsa Hindustan hai ye? Yahan jawan bachhe hain jinhe aaj tak maalum nahi tha curfew kya hota hai. Ye aane waale samay ke liye khatarnaak sanket hain. Shambhu koi swatantra sainani nahi tha. Uski puuja kyun ho rahi hai?”

“[We’re sitting on a gunpowder keg. What India is this? There are young children here who did not know till today what a curfew is. These are bad omens of the coming times. Shambhulal was not a freedom fighter. Why have people begun worshipping him?]”

On the morning of December 6, Iqbal Khan, a Rajsamand based businessman, was called upon by the police to identify a body. Near the body, he was told, a motorcycle was found bearing ‘786’, and star and crescent stickers. The dead was likely to be a Muslim.

“When I reached the spot what I saw was a charred lump of flesh being torn apart by street dogs. I had no idea of who he was. Even if I were someone I knew, it would have been impossible to find out,” Khan said.

A few hours later he received a WhatsApp message. It was a video of Shambhulal hacking Mohammed Afrazul and later setting him on fire.

“Main teen din tak nahi soya uske baad. Ek dehshat ka mahaul ban gaya hai idhar. [I did not sleep for three nights after seeing that video. There is an atmosphere of terror],” Khan says.

Mohammed Rafiq, another Muslim resident of Rajsamand adds, “Hum ab ek duusre se aakhein nahi milate. Us raaste se ab hum nahi jaate. Aisa mahaul pehle nahi tha [We Muslims and Hindus don’t look each other in the eye anymore. We don’t go past that road where Shambhulal murdered Afrazul. This sort of atmosphere wasn’t there before].”

“We were together the whole night. There is a lot of anger and suspicion among the people here. But we’re constantly appealing for peace,” said Feroze Khan, a lawyer based in Rajsamand.

Munobar Ashraf Khan, an office bearer in Anjuman, a Muslim religious body, in Udaipur talked about the time when his 13-year-old daughter showed him the video of Afrazul’s murder on her phone.

“Meri bachhi ne dikhaya tha mujhe. Uski zehni haalat theek nahi thi wo video dekhkar. Fir wohi video news channel pe bhi chalne laga. Hum log kaafi dar gaye the. Padosiyon ke ghar sone chale gaye the [My daughter showed me the video of Afrazul’s murder. Her mental state wasn’t good after it. Then all of us saw the video on a news channel. We were quite scared. Went to sleep in neighbour’s house].”

Several Muslims, including those from West Bengal just like Shambhulal’s victim, left the city. While the natives have now returned, the migrant labourers say they will not return till Mamata Banerjee assures them of their safety.

“There were around 30-35 of us who fled immediately. Among us are several Hindus also. They also fear for their lives. We have worked in Rajsamand for last 15 years but never imagined something like this would happen. Contractors there owe us our salaries. In the rush to leave we’ve also left behind our machines and belongings. But we won’t return for all these till Mamata Banerjee gives us a go ahead,” said Najidul.

We’re sitting on a gunpowder keg. What India is this?

In the din of communal hatred around Shambhulal Regar, Muslim voices from within the BJP have also started speaking up against the insecurity they now feel. This is what Tanveer, the head of BJP-run Mewar Kshatriya Mahasabha, had to say about the recent developments.

“Baarud ke dher pe bitha diya hai hame. Kaunsa Hindustan hai ye? Yahan jawan bachhe hain jinhe aaj tak maalum nahi tha curfew kya hota hai. Ye aane waale samay ke liye khatarnaak sanket hain. Shambhu koi swatantra sainani nahi tha. Uski puuja kyun ho rahi hai?”

“[We’re sitting on a gunpowder keg. What India is this? There are young children here who did not know till today what a curfew is. These are bad omens of the coming times. Shambhulal was not a freedom fighter. Why have people begun worshipping him?]”

A senior cleric in Udaipur said that fires have been stoked both ways. Not willing to share his name, the cleric said that not only has he now to appeal for peace from the community at large, he has been asking young bloods from his own community to keep their tempers under check and shun the fancies of revenge.

“Children have come to me saying ‘we’ll take care of things’. Now I am firefighting on two ends. They’re saying unless we act now there will be nothing left to fight for in future. I have been asking them to concentrate on studies. For the first time in my life my grandchildren are asking me about the faith and belief of their Hindu friends. Look what has happened to this society.”

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Produced by: Sheikh Saaliq

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