We’ve all heard it said that if we stop following the news for a while, we’ll be disabused of a number of pessimistic notions – such as the idea that that India is deeply divided along caste and religious lines ,or that deep mistrust festers beneath the cordiality with which members of India’s myriad religious communities co-exist. Now, you may or may not believe that starving yourself of news will imbue your world view with optimism. But if you suspect that inter-confessional unity in India is more of an idea than a fact, this video of an Independence Day ‘prank’ will make you think again.
On August 15, RadioMirchi’s RJ Naved travelled to Nizammudin and Kalka Mandir, and filmed himself in shops and markets pretending to call people to unite Muslims against Hindus (in Nizamuddin, a Muslim-majority area), or do the opposite (in Kalkaji). He made sure he was loud enough to be heard by the people around him, and their reactions — he says at the end of the video — were exactly what he thought he would hear.
“Hindus and Muslims live together and they will always do. They’ll live right here, and they’ll die right here,” a shopkeeper in Nizamuddin told Naved in the video. The man was visibly agitated when he heard Naved saying on the phone that Muslims couldn’t love their Hindu brethren, and that it was their own fault that they made “compromises” for Hindus.
Another man in Nizammudin actually pushed Naved away, saying he didn’t deserve to stand there, let alone stay in this country. “Get the hell out of here,” he said as he chased away the RJ-in-disguise.
Shoppers and store-owners in Kalka Mandir weren’t any more sympathetic to Naved’s undercover persona.
“Aren’t you ashamed of yourself for spreading such hatred?” a man asked him in front of a glittering storefront. “It’s because of people like you that there is a Pakistan and an India, and such hatred between people,” he said. Another man — a shopkeeper — simply refused to sell him anything, and dismissed him with imperious waves of his hand.
At the end of the video, Naved had a message for us all: “Please stay united. Otherwise, someone else might take advantage of our mutual hostility.”

You can watch the video here:

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