India's Love Jihad Debate: Political Gambit or Genuine Concern?
In this heated poll season, India is once again caught in a battle royale between the Gods, another Love Jihad (LJ) which is raising temperatures. LJ, a convenient political tool and de rigueur wrapped in welfare schemes and development that helped bring BJP to power at the Centre twice over. Whereby, ishq-mohabat-shaadi cutting across caste and religious boundaries inter-meshed with forced conversions churned the political cauldron resulting in an unholy clash between the ‘holier than thou’! The latest Love Jihad outcry has its genesis in murder of a Karnataka college girl by her former classmate in Hubballi which has ignited a political firestorm in the State, with the girl’s family alleging the accused had been pressuring her to religiously convert and marry him. Naturally, the BJP termed it a case of ‘love jihad,’ hitting out at the Siddaramaiah-led Government, accusing it of playing politics of appeasement at the expense of law and order. With the ruling Congress staunchly denying
