Kerala: 2 PFI Men Arrested in Hate Slogan Row; DYFI Condemns ‘Communal Agenda'

Kochi: Kerala Police arrested two activists of the Popular Front of India (PFI) in connection with provocative hate slogans raised at a rally in Alappuzha, Kerala, on Saturday. Video clips of a minor boy sitting on a man's shoulders with the PFI flag draped around him and raising communally charged hate slogans for the crowd were being circulated on social media.

Ansar Najeeb (30), who was seen carrying the child in the videos, was taken into police custody on Monday from Erattupetta in the Kottayam district. Alappuzha South Police arrested Nawas Vandanam, Alappuzha district president of PFI and an organiser of the rally, on Tuesday. The case is registered under Section 153A of the IPC.

Police are trying to identify more people who shouted the slogans recited by the child from the video. The child has not been identified yet. A special investigation team has been appointed to look into the incident. Local media reports suggest the police might take more PFI men into custody in connection with the incident.

Although PFI claims the slogans were about resisting RSS, the content of the slogans stands questionable. As seen in the video clips, the slogans recited by the child include communally sensitive content targeted against other communities. The slogans are potentially capable of communal polarisation, and they may spark enmity between groups on the grounds of faith. Following the controversy, PFI state leadership disowned the slogans saying they were not 'distributed slogans'.

PFI, an Islamist outfit, also has a long track record for similar charges of communal hatred and violence. The murder of Abhimanyu, an SFI activist from Maharajas College, Ernakulam, in 2018, had resulted in a wide public outrage against the Popular Front. The 2010 assault on TJ Joseph, a professor, in Thodupuzha is another infamous episode in PFI's past.

Meanwhile, secular forces in the state have come strongly against PFI on the incident. MA Baby, a Polit Bureau member of the CPI(M), in a Facebook response, said the PFI-SDPI is the other side of the RSS-BJP. “They are not far behind the RSS in violence or communal poison that they propagate. Less in number, but with equal might. I was saddened by the slogan of religious hatred chanted by a child at a PFI rally. At that age, the child is also a victim of communal venom!” Baby wrote on Facebook.

Democratic Youth Federation of India (DYFI) state secretariat, in their statement, said the slogans were a manifestation of a communal agenda to divide secular Kerala. The death-threat slogan chanted by a little boy at the Popular Front rally in Alappuzha is a testament to the operations of communal organisations that sow seeds of communal venom and hatred towards other faiths, even in the minds of children. The content of these slogans would disturb the secular atmosphere in Kerala. The sectarian forces of different colours feed each other through such provocations, further polarising society. Hindutva-Islamist extremists know the communal outfits cannot grow unless they destroy the secular unity in the state, said DYFI in their statement. The left-wing youth organisation also urged the public to resist such concerted efforts to break that unity.

The statement also alarms the general public against the use of children to propagate hate. Communal outfits raise children to hate other faiths from an early age when children need to learn love, compassion, and peaceful co-existence, the DYFI statement added.

The DYFI had been organising local level peace rallies against communal violence in Palakkad district after the twin murders of Subair, a PFI leader, and Sreenivasan, an RSS leader last month. The accused arrested in connection with these murders were workers of RSS and PFI, respectively.