Think of a scenario – a child or adult's picture is taken from social media, doctored and posted for sale on an app. Yes, a human being is sought to be ‘auctioned’ online. Horrifying? Yes, it is. Now add the fact that it is only girls and women that are being ‘sold’, more particularly from one particular community. This actually happened with the Bulli Bai and Sulli Deals apps. The deliberate, targeted attacks are both communal and patriarchal; reflecting the ugly realities of Islamophobia and misogyny in our society.
The words bulli and sulli are both derogatory terms used for Muslim females, mainly used by online right-wing trolls. Last year in July, Sulli Deals came to light. It was an app that displayed images of Muslim girls and women ‘for sale’. These images were taken without consent, usually from social media, doctored and offered by 'auction' basically for illegal human trafficking. The app was shut down, but no one was arrested or booked for this.
Six months later, on 1 Jan, many Muslim women were horrified to find themselves on another such app called Bulli Bai. This time it was a little less random, most of the women were voices that spoke out on various issue on Twitter and elsewhere. The women ‘listed’ included social workers, journalists and students as well. There were strong protests and calls for investigations and arrests from prominent voices. The efforts of people such as MP Priyanka Chaturvedi have resulted in the arrest of Vishal Jha from Bangalore and Shweta Singh from Uttarakhand.
These apps that claim to ‘sell’ Muslim women are but one symptom of a ferociously communal turn that our society has taken in recent years. Apart from the lynching incidents in which Muslims and to an extent Dalits have overwhelmingly been the victims, there is much else that points to rising Islamophobia. Incidents such as the Rajsamand horror tell the story of a deep and truly virulent hatred.
We had a lawyer calling for violence against Muslims openly at Jantar Mantar. We have a ‘Dharam Sansad’ in Haridwar where there are public calls for genocide and ethnic cleansing of Muslims. Hate speech is not punished – there is social acceptance and tacit political support for it. This creates a culture of impunity. When Sulli Deals is not punished, this is an encouragement to create Bulli Bai app soon thereafter.
The hate is corrosive and it demands more and more people and groups to hate on. For instance, the Sikh community was thought of as the ideal Indian minority – until the farmers' protests, that is. As soon as this community was seen spearheading the protest against what was seen as bad laws, they because ‘anti-national’ as well. The fake ID of the Bulli Deals app was falsely shown as being a Khalistani supporter - yet another insidious attempt to create public hatred against minorities. Over Christmas, we had people being attacked for celebrating Christmas. We also saw churches being vandalised and schools being interrupted. We have seen systematic social and economic boycotts of Muslim traders and establishments.
Now consider how misogynistic this whole thing is. We are still a society where ‘honour’ is seen to vest in the women of the family or society at large. So when someone wants to attack a family or community, women are the easy target. So when the apps target women specifically and set them up for ‘sale’ this is an 'insult' to the community as well. Tellingly, the women listed on the Bulli Bai app are those who are known to stand up for their beliefs and speak out against what they see as injustice or social evils that need to change. Attacking and silencing vocal women is a feature of the patriarchy.
We think that we are safe from attacks such as these either because we are from the majority or because we are good law-abiding citizens. The fact is that none of us is safe from the politics of hate. This is the mindset that looks for more and more groups to hate and to ‘other’ise: it starts with Muslims, it goes on to Christians and then Sikhs and then anyone seen as different or dissenting. When there is no punishment – in fact, we have been perpetrators of lynching incidents being felicitated publicly – the hate is emboldened and strengthened.
Ugly and horrifying incidents such as Sulli Deals and Bulli Bai show us a mirror of our society and what we see is not pretty. Make no mistake, these are not stray incidents, nor are they just law and order issues. These are systemic hate crimes. We can see how the communal fault lines in our society are being nurtured and widened deliberately. We see that misogyny continues to punish women who have the temerity to hold opinions and that dare to speak out. The fact is that the hatred is a beast that demands to be fed – the more reason to hate, the better for the beast. The fact is that none of us is safe unless all of us are safe.
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