Minorities rally in Gandhinagar, seek separate minority affairs department, commission, budget

By A Representative
The civil rights organization, Minority Coordination Committee (MCC), organized a mass rally in Gandhinagar on December 18, which happens to be the International Minority Rights Day, in order to press for the “basic demands” of the minorities, who form 11.5% of Gujarat’s population.
Organized at what has informally come to be known as Satyagrah Chhavani (cantonment) in the state capital, the rally sough to highlight the fact that there is no separate allocation for minorities’ welfare, nor is there any minority affairs department or state minority commission to take care of their rights.

Addressing the gathering, MCC convener Mujahid Nafees said that in Gujarat, the minority community is living in fear. Even those transport buffaloes are lynched by cow vigilantes. Calling the government’s slogan of Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao “fake”, Nafees informed the gathering, “In Gujarat, the Muslim girls’ dropout rate at the junior primary level (classes 1 to 5) is 10.58%, yet the government is not taking any concrete action on this.” 

“There is no commission to listen to the complaints of the minorities in Gujarat”, he said, adding, “Such is the discrimination in Gujarat that here the minorities do not even have basic rights available in in other states. MCC has made many efforts to highlight the demands of the minorities, but there has been no substantial response from the government.”