Read the previous installments of the Hindu Rashtra Project here.

One October morning last year, a group of men arrived at Vandana Convent School in Madhya Pradesh’s Guna district. Leading them was the father of a class 3 student. The rest were members of a local Hindutva outfit, and they had come with a list of demands.

They claimed a Muslim student had assaulted his child, and that the teacher had physically punished only the Hindu boy — proof, they said, of anti-Hindu bias in a Christian-run school. They demanded that the teacher be suspended, the Muslim student shifted to another class, and a written apology be issued by the school.

But CCTV footage from the classroom showed otherwise. There had been no fight. No punishment either.

Still, the school complied. Just as it had months earlier when another mob — this time led by ABVP activists — barged ​​in after the principal asked students to “speak in English”. They had forced the principal to “apologise” and filed an FIR against her for “hurting religious sentiments”.

That wasn’t all. School staff allege that after these incidents, members apparently of the ABVP began frequenting the premises, demanding to monitor the school’s functioning. The school was allegedly asked why images of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chief Minister Mohan Yadav were missing from the walls — even though national figures like Mahatma Gandhi and Dr BR Ambedkar were already displayed. There was a demand that a portrait of Goddess Saraswati be installed. The school gave in again, putting up photos of the PM and CM in the lobby.