In 2015, the horror of the lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq, allegedly by a mob that included his neighbours, on suspicion of killing a calf and storing beef, echoed far beyond his village, Bisada. In its aftermath, “cow vigilantism” and “gau rakshaks” became a disquietingly familiar part of the public vocabulary. Disturbing, too, has been the fact that several politicians and social leaders associated with the ruling party or its ideological parivar either equivocate on the attacks on minorities, or turn a blind eye to them. And, in a shocking inversion of justice, as in the Akhlaq case, the families of many of those assaulted or killed........

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