Editorial: Denying Muslims Constitutional Rights: Why "I Love Mohammed" Evokes Fear and Incites Persecution
Nov 01, 2025By PUCL Editorial
The criminalisation of the words ‘I Love Mohammad’, portends a new level of intolerance in India towards constitutionally protected speech in India. When Muslims expressed their outrage at this outlawing of constitutionally protected speech they were subjected to arbitrary arrests and their property was subjected to punitive demolitions. The only logical conclusion one can draw is that the freedoms we took for granted as Indians are today being deliberately denied to members of the Muslim community.
It began innocuously enough on the occasion of the Barawat in memory of Prophet Mohammad on 4th September, 2025. As part of the celebrations in the Rawatpur area of Kanpur, the organisers put a light board with the words, ‘I Love Mohammad’. This board was opposed by certain right wing groups and it was taken down by the organisers. However to their shock, an FIR was registered against some of the organisers on 10th September, alleging that “an attempt was also made to deliberately start a new tradition by putting up a ‘I Love Muhammad’ banner at one Kunnu Kabadi’s place in Rawatpur village, which resulted in communal tension and confrontation.’
This unconstitutional state action sent shock waves through the Muslim community. After all, what is wrong about declaring one’s love for one’s God and choosing to ‘practice’ one’s faith in the manner of one’s choosing? The FIR registered by the Kanpur police was deplorable, as it sought to control the very ways in which one could choose to ‘profess’ and ‘practise’ one’s faith, a freedom the constitution recognizes under Article 25.
Furthermore, the FIR trampled on another constitutional value which is at the very heart of our democracy, the freedom of speech and expression. The constitution protects expression because it is through exercising speech that ‘individuals grow and develop as human beings and create a meaningful life for ourselves’. The idea of expression is central to the way human beings create their own identities. By criminalizing an expression for being a ‘new tradition’, the state has seized for itself the power to define the boundaries of acceptable religious practice.
It was because the Kanpur police sought to trample upon these two essential freedoms that there was such a strong response across the country. The expression, ‘I love Muhammad’, came to be owned by Muslims nationwide, with protests taking place in over twenty two cities spread across Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Telangana, Gujarat, Karnataka and Maharashtra.
What is troubling is that the response to this peaceful assertion of the constitutional freedoms of speech, assembly, and faith was an even stronger crackdown by the state. According to a report from the Association for Protecting Civil Rights (APCR), ‘in a span of 30 days, 45 FIRs have been filed in 23 cities. All of them are against Muslims. A total of 4,505 Muslims have been booked—544 are named and 3,961, unidentified. 265 Muslims have been arrested till October 7.’
The most disturbing crackdown again happened in UP, in the town of Bareilly on 26th September. In response to a call by the cleric, Maulana Tauqeer Raza, large numbers gathered outside Ala Hazrat Dargah after Friday prayers, carrying ‘I Love Muhammad’ placards. According to police, 90–95% of the crowd dispersed peacefully, but a faction began creating disturbances. When police invoked Section 163 of the Bharatiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) to disperse the group, clashes ensued. Ten police personnel were injured, and violence spread to Dargah-e-Ala Hazrat, Islamia Ground, Alamgiriganj, Civil Lines, Bada Bazaar, and Bansmandi. Police responded with a lathi charge and tear gas, later deploying additional forces. In the aftermath, 10 FIRs were registered, naming over 2,000 people.
The APCR report notes that, ‘the FIRs repeatedly name Maulana Tauqeer Raza and other community members and include many “unknown” persons, casting a wide net that fails to distinguish between peaceful participants, bystanders, and those allegedly involved in violence. This broad-brush approach turns a constitutionally protected act of expression into a criminal offense for an entire community.’ The FIRs not only invoked provisions like Sections 190 and 191 of the BNS for unlawful assembly and rioting, but also more serious sections invoking offences promoting enmity among groups (198) as well as murder (103).
APCR contends that, ‘this use of serious charges in the FIRs, without any supporting evidence or even allegation to bear them out, appears designed to intimidate and suppress further peaceful mobilization through legal overreach.’ A close examination, APCR concludes, reveals that the narratives in these FIRs exaggerate and distort the reality on the ground; ‘Injuries to police personnel were minor; no firearms or weapons were recovered; and no clear evidence ties individuals to violent acts…The demonstration did not involve slogans, vandalism, or violence.’
This legal and administrative overreach was not the end. In further evidence of not just legal overreach but blatantly illegal and unconstitutional actions, the UP government went ahead with punitive demolitions of the property of those who were accused of offences. On October 4-5, the Raza Palace banquet hall, owned by Dr. Nafees, a close aide of Tauqeer Raza, was razed under heavy security. Officials claimed the 500-square-meter property was illegally built on Waqf land. On October 6, five more properties were sealed, including those of Samajwadi Party councillor Abdul Qayyum Khan Munna, Wajid Beg, Nazir Khan, Zakir Pradhan, and Mohammad Irfan. An e-rickshaw charging station linked to cleric’s son-in-law, Uman Raza, was also demolished.
Such demolitions are in contempt of the Supreme Court order in Jamiat Ulama I Hind v. North Delhi Municipal Corporation where the court ordered a stay on illegal demolitions. The PUCL has repeatedly deprecated this well-document pattern of punitive demolitions , characterizing each punitive demolition as a ‘hammer blow targeting the basic structure of the Indian Constitution.’ It is vital that the UP State act in conformity with the judgment of the Supreme Court and desist from this heinous practice. Only when punitive demolitions cease can the Indian Constitutional order survive and India remain a rule of law society.
What the events described above seem to portend is a loss of constitutional status for the Muslim community. If you are Muslim in India today, your constitutional freedoms are curtailed by an authoritarian state. If you exercise your constitutional freedom of worship, you are likely to have an FIR registered against you. If you choose to protest this unconstitutional restriction through a public assembly, the assembly is likely to be shut down by the police itself. If you choose to continue to assert your rights, then you and members of your community are likely to face police raids and mass arrests. Added to these blatant violations are the further violation you are likely to face – namely the demolition of shops you own and the sealing of businesses you operate. All of this amounts to nothing less than a total assault on the very right to exist of the Muslim community.
It is also an attack on the right to love, as UP not only criminalises expression of love towards one’s God but also criminalises love marriages using the bogey of religious conversions. It seems clear that as far as the current dispensation is concerned, love with its subversive potential is a criminal offence, but hate is the preferred currency of the state.
What is indeed troubling is that this latest assault on the constitution has not invoked a larger outrage among all those who believe that India is constitutional democracy with a guarantee of equal rights to all its citizens. This lack of outrage was diagnosed most presciently by Babasaheb Ambedkar as being based on the absence of a ‘public conscience.’, which in Ambedkar’s words is a ‘Condition precedent for the successful working of democracy’. By ‘public conscience’, he means, ‘conscience which becomes agitated at every wrong; no matter who is the sufferer and it means that everybody whether He suffers that particular wrong or not, is prepared to join him in order to get him relieved.’
It is vital that we the ‘people of India’ exercise our ‘public conscience’ and strongly oppose the denial of rights to the Muslim community. This is vital, if India is to survive as a constitutional democracy based on equal rights for all persons.