The intellectuals who wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the lynching incidents in the nation are trying to give it a religious color, said BJP leader and Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose's grandson, Chandra Kumar Bose, on Friday.
"If these intellectuals are standing for a certain community and not standing up for the rest I will oppose them. It becomes an attempt to divide the nation on religious grounds and I will fight them tooth and nail. I am against lynching and I am sure our Prime Minister will stop lynching incidents in the country," Bose told ANI here.
49 celebrities from different fields including singers, actors, filmmakers among others, wrote a letter to Prime Minister Modi on Tuesday, demanding that "exemplary punishment" should be meted out "swiftly and surely" in lynching cases.
The personalities also highlighted that 'Jai Shri Ram' has become a "provocative war-cry" in the present day that leads to law and order problems and "many lynchings take place in its name."
He narrated his own ordeal which he faced when was the victim of a mob attack back in 1992 where he had been lucky to escape alive and termed lynching a "heinous crime".
"It is not a question of supporting the intellectuals or anyone else. The issue is lynching, which is a heinous crime. I myself was a victim of a mob attack way back in 1992, even today when I think of that incident shiver runs down my spine. Over a 100-person strong mob had attacked me in Guwahati after the Babri Masjid demolition, I was saved by sheer luck from the mob but more than 120 people were burnt by mobs at the same spot," Bose added.
He went on to ask people to stop linking lynching incidents with religion and added anyone who was guilty in these cases should be punished harshly irrespective of his origins.
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"Lynching must immediately stop and the centre and state governments should be proactive to stop the lynching. What I fail to understand is why people are relating it with religion. The person who gets involved in lynching, whether he is a Christian, Hindu, Muslim or Sikh must be punished under the law," he added.
He went on to add, "A crime is a crime, it cannot be given a religious color. The people who wrote a letter are free to write to the PM, this is a free nation but giving it a religious color is highly objectionable. I believe in the ideology of Subhash Chandra Bose who united all religions and fought for India's freedom. Any person who tries to give it a religious color is my enemy.