A 21-year-old Muslim student has died following a violent altercation with a group of alleged Hindu men in Gujarat, India, during a heated political argument at a Hindu religious festival. The family alleges that the Muslim student was attacked first.
Sultan Iqbalbhai Shaikh suffered fatal injuries during a confrontation near Satyam Society in Dakor, in Gujarat’s Kheda district, late on 14 October. His father, Mohammad Iqbal Shaikh, was also seriously injured.
The family alleges that the pair were attacked by members of an opposing group, made up of sectarian Hindu men. Relatives have also raised questions about the time taken for medical assistance to arrive and the treatment they received.
Speaking to 5Pillars, Sultan’s uncle, Altaf, said loud music from nearby Navratri celebrations made it difficult to hear what was happening during the incident.
Navratri is a major Hindu festival celebrated over nine nights in honour of the Divine Feminine, particularly the pagan idol Durga and her various forms.
“It all happened at night. We really couldn’t figure out what exactly went on,” he said.
The family said an ambulance took around 30 minutes to arrive after being called.
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Footage obtained by 5Pillars shows Sultan lying on the ground in a pool of blood with a serious neck injury. According to relatives, women in the family tried to help him while waiting for the ambulance but were unable to stop the bleeding.
Sultan was later taken to a hospital in Nadiad, where he was pronounced dead, according to his relatives.
Local media reports said the confrontation began at around 11pm near Satyam Society in the Navi Nagari area of Dakor.
The reported trigger was a disagreement over voting patterns in the previous municipal election and support for an independent candidate. The argument allegedly escalated into a street confrontation involving sharp weapons between two rival sides.
Eight people were reportedly injured in the fight, including five from the Muslim side and three from the rival Hindu group. Gujarat First reported that a woman was also among those injured.
Kheda Superintendent of Police Vijay Patel said legal action had been initiated against 16 people, with eight detained from each group. Police registered complaints from both sides, and additional security personnel were deployed in Dakor.
Sultan’s relatives dispute the characterisation of the incident as a mutual confrontation. They maintain that Sultan and his father were attacked by members of the opposing group first.
The competing accounts are under investigation. The precise circumstances surrounding Sultan’s fatal injuries have yet to be fully established.
“He was our only son”
Sultan was the only child of Mohammad Iqbal Shaikh, who works as a daily-wage labourer. His relatives described him as a student who concentrated on his education and had no known history of involvement in fights.
“My son never got involved in fights; he was focused only on his studies. We had never heard any complaints against him. He was unjustly targeted and killed. Could they not have shown some mercy? How brutally they attacked my child?” the family said.
Sultan’s father and uncle both work as daily-wage labourers in Dakor, according to the family. His death has left his parents mourning the loss of their only son, while his father continues to recover from serious injuries.
The family has also alleged that staff at the government hospital in Dakor declined to treat Sultan and his father because their injuries were too severe.
Relatives said the two were subsequently taken to Nadiad for treatment, where Sultan was pronounced dead.
The family has questioned the time taken for medical assistance to arrive and the decision to transfer the injured men to another hospital.
The information available to 5Pillars did not include a response from the hospital authorities to the allegations. It was also unclear whether a separate inquiry into the alleged delay in treatment had been initiated.
The circumstances surrounding the reported refusal of treatment and the time taken to transport the injured men could not be independently established from the information available.
A Muslim community leader from Nadiad visited the family after Sultan’s death and condemned the incident, according to local media reports.
Concerns over violence against Muslims
Dakor is a town in Gujarat, a state governed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Hindu nationalist party led nationally by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The BJP have long been condemned for promoting a Hindu extremist political ideology known as Hindutva which preaches that India should be a Hindu majority religious state and that religious minorities, including Muslims, Christians and Sikhs, are subhuman and should be expelled from Indian society or heavily marginalised.
Sectarian Hindutva-led violence against Indian Muslims has increased dramatically across the country since the BJP rose to power.
Gujarat-based journalist Sahal Qureshi told 5Pillars that members of the Hindu majority had developed a sense of impunity under the BJP-led government, which he said contributed to recurring incidents of violence.
His remarks reflect his assessment of the political climate in Gujarat and its implications for religious minorities. They are not, in themselves, an independently established finding about the circumstances of Sultan’s death.
For Sultan’s family, the immediate concern is the loss of their only son and the unanswered questions surrounding the attack and the medical assistance he received.
Sultan was 21. His relatives say he was focused on his studies and had his future ahead of him. His family is now seeking answers about the circumstances that led to his death.
