The silent agony of innocent muslims

After every incident of a terror attack or any violence linked even remotely to a Muslim identity, millions of innocent Muslims find themselves in a vulnerable position and under the suffocating weight of answerability. It is not the weight of guilt, for we have committed no crime. It is the burden of expectation—that we must apologise, defend, and disown an act we abhor as deeply as any other human being.

Proofs of the community’s loyalty—its humanity—are demanded subtly and openly. We are expected to post condemnations on social media and to declare loudly in conversations that we oppose violence, that “they” (terrorists) do not represent “us”.

And if we do not, silence itself is taken as admission. We try hard everywhere to prove our credibility.

Friendships grow uneasy. Friends call up after years and make us realise that this should not have happened, as if we were somehow aware of what was to come. Where once there was easy laughter, there now creeps suspicion—a slight distance in conversations, a careful politeness where warmth once lived. Invitations disappear. Eyes linger longer on our faces, searching, perhaps, for hidden anger, for unspoken allegiance to a crime we mourn more sincerely than the ones who question us.

The public gaze is harsher. When an attack happens, Muslims do not watch the news with simple horror; they watch with dread, knowing that tomorrow, at work, in class, or in the market, they will be seen not as individuals but as possible extensions of that hatred.

An acquaintance might ask, “Why do your people do this?”

A colleague might say, “Not all Muslims are bad, but…”

And thus, our entire identity is confined to a stereotype.

The tragedy of incidents like the Pahalgam attack is twofold for us. First, there is the sheer pain that innocent lives are lost. And second, the deeper wound is that we—though unrelated—are still blamed by association.

We carry flowers to the graves of the victims in our hearts, even as we carry the extra burden of suspicion on our backs.

The demand for apology grows louder each time, and it is becoming harder to bear. Why must an entire community constantly kneel at the altar of public forgiveness? Why must we continuously announce that terrorism is not our faith when our lives themselves—our friendships, our work, our silent prayers for peace—should be proof enough? Why, even after more than 75 years of India’s independence, do we still have to prove our credibility?

There is a cruelty in forcing the innocent to answer for the guilty.

There is a deep injustice in making the victims of suspicion feel like accomplices of crimes they hate.

The world must understand:

We are not guilty by birth, nor should we live on trial forever. Our sorrow is real, our horror is real, and our longing for peace is real.

And when tragedy strikes, we are shocked like everyone else—perhaps even more—because we know the mourning will not end with the dead but will follow us too: in every look, in every hesitant handshake, and in every demand to “prove” that we are good and we are not like that.

It’s time to hate those individuals who committed the heinous act and have empathy for those who lost their loved ones. It’s a heart-wrenching moment for all of us, and we are equally hurt and in pain. The guilt of a few cannot be placed upon the shoulders of an entire community.

At a time when the world places us on the scales of suspicion, those who have endured the deepest wounds are choosing to view this tragedy through the lens of humanity and not religion.

Finally, violence of every sort is a crime against humanity, and all humans should condemn it.