Authorities in New Delhi halted demolition efforts in a predominantly Muslim neighborhood after hundreds of residents and scores of opposition party workers gathered to protest Monday.
No buildings were leveled before the bulldozers retreated.
Anti-Muslim sentiment and attacks have soared across India in the past month, including stone-throwing between Hindu and Muslim groups during religious processions, followed by demolition in several states where many Muslim-owned properties were demolished by local authorities.
This was most recently seen last month in a northwestern neighborhood of New Delhi where bulldozers destroyed some Muslim property before the Supreme Court halted travel. The demolition came days after communal violence there left several people injured and prompted arrests.
Amid a heavy police presence on Monday, bulldozers arrived in Shaheen Bagh, a neighborhood that in 2020 became the scene of fierce protests after Parliament passed a controversial law the previous year changing the country’s citizenship law. The new law will accelerate naturalization for persecuted religious minorities from several neighboring Islamic countries, but excludes Muslims, prompting many to call it discriminatory.
This sparked months of demonstrations from across India and Shaheen Bagh quickly became a symbol of resistance, with protests there led by a peaceful sit-in by Muslim women along a highway that passes through the neighborhood.
Officials say the demolition drive is targeting illegal buildings and not specific religious groups. But critics argue that the move is the latest attempt to harass and marginalize Muslims, who make up 14% of India’s 1.4 billion population, and points to a pattern of increasing religious polarization under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.
As the bulldozer drove away, Mohammed Niyaz, a 47-year-old resident of the neighborhood, called it “voice bank politics” meant to divide the Hindu and Muslim communities.
Residents in Shaheen Bagh also questioned the timing of the bulldozers’ removal, saying many buildings in the neighborhood had stood for decades without local government intervention. Previously, officials called the recent demolition action a “routine exercise” to bring down illegal property.