New Delhi, Feb 6: A Facebook page was taken down by the social network after one of its posts alleged ‘love jihad‘ and provoked the “Hindu lions” to “hunt” down the Muslim men listed in the post. The Facebook post on the page called Hindutva Varta was blocked after the post sparked outrage on social media for explicitly inciting violence.
The list, posted on the Facebook page, had names of at least 102 couples and the links directing people to their (couples’) profiles. The list, according to the reports, was posted on January 28 on the Hindutva Varta page.
The page was pulled down on Sunday night, nearly a week after the post was made live. The list had earlier been shared on a page called ‘Justice for Hindus’. The post, however, didn’t call for any violence against the couples.
On Monday, February 5, a man with screenname Satish Mylavarapu claimed responsibility for the Hindutva Varta Facebook page. “I am proud to be admin of that page Hindutva Varta…Will create new page again,” Satish Mylavarapu responded to an Alt News tweet from an unverified handle.
“Maintaining a safe community for people to connect and share on Facebook is absolutely critical to us. We have policies that prohibit hate speech and credible threats of harm, and we remove such content when we’re made aware of it,” a Facebook spokesperson told Times of India.
In December 2017, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Ghaziabad city president Ajay Sharma and Bajrang Dal activists disrupted a wedding function of a Muslim man and Hindu girl calling the marriage a case of “love jihad”. The BJP and Bajrang Dal men, who created a ruckus for about five hours which eventually lead to police lathicharge, were later joined by Hindu Raksha Dal and Dharam Jagran Manch men.