Arbaaz Shaikh began his career 12 years ago as a sales boy at a cloth store in Sitlamata market, a popular cloth hub in Madhya Pradesh’s Indore.

He worked 10 hours every day, showing saris and lehengas to customers bustling through the narrow lane where the market is located.

In 2024, Shaikh invested all his savings to rent a tiny store in the same market and start his own business. With five workers on his payroll, he earned about Rs 50,000 every month selling fabric.

But on September 22, Shaikh was forced to vacate the shop, move his entire stock to his home and fire all his employees.

“In the last four days I have had zero business,” Shaikh said. “And my workers are unemployed.”

He is not the only one. This week, about 40 to 50 Muslim tenants in the market have had to leave their shops and 100 Muslim workers have been removed from their jobs after the son of the local Bharatiya Janata Party MLA forced a ban on them.

Scroll spoke to several businessmen who operate out of the market. They said that about a month ago, Aklavya Singh Gaur, the son of BJP MLA Malini Gaur, held a series of meetings with them and asked them to evict their Muslim tenants and sack Muslim employees by September 25.

Malini Gaur represents the Indore-4 assembly constituency in which Sitlamata market is located. Aklavya Gaur leads an outfit called Hind Rakshak, which claims to protect “Hindu culture”.

Sitlamata Cloth Market Association backed Gaur’s diktat, which was verbally communicated to all the merchants in the market, the shop owners said.

On September 24, in a rare show of unity, Hindu and Muslim shop owners and workers came together in the city’s main square, Rajwada, to protest against the forced eviction. They held black posters with phrases promoting Hindu and Muslim unity written on it.

In a video that went viral on social media, Balwant Singh Rathore, a shopkeeper, said he ran his shop named “Sada Suhagan” along with his Muslim partner, Mohamed Harun . Protesting against the eviction, he said: “Hindu-and Muslim brotherhood should continue. We should not be separated.”

Rathore added: “We are fighting to fill our stomachs. We may be forced to go to court if required.”

Harun told Scroll that he and Rathore met 10 years ago in Indore and have two shops in the market: one 20 years old and the other is a year old.

“We have vacated one shop,” said Harun. “The owner of the second shop has not asked us to leave yet. We eat both our meals together. Now politics is trying to divide us.”

On September 25, under pressure to comply with the diktat, several Hindu shop owners dismissed their employees.

District Congress committee president Vipin Wankhede said his party members were holding a series of meetings with the police commissioner to prevent the “illegal evictions”.

“This is Hindutva politics,” Wankhede said. “And it is impacting both communities.”

Aklavya Gaur and Sitlamata Cloth Market Association head Hema Panjwani did not respond to calls and messages. MLA Malini Gaur could not be reached for comment.

Indore Deputy Commissioner of Police Anand Kaladgi told Newslaundry on September 24 that no case was registered since there was “no official video” of Gaur issuing the ultimatum. “He has not made any statement openly, and there is no video evidence except what is in the media,” Kaladgi told Newslaundry. “We are working on this issue and trying to resolve it.”

Javed Akhtar, the Madhya Pradesh secretary of the Association for Protection of Civil Rights, said this was not an isolated incident where a minority community had been targeted in the state. “Similar instances where Muslims are boycotted have been ongoing across the state,” Shaikh said.

Employed for years, dismissed for no reason

Located in a lane close to the Holkar palace, Sitlamata market is one of the oldest markets in Indore. Some of its 500 establishments are nearly a century old. According to the Congress leader Wankhede, around 150 of them are run by Muslim tenants. Even those owned and run by Hindus employ Muslims in large numbers.

For 20 years, Mohammed Shakir Hussain, aged 35, has been working in a store named Bahubali that sells readymade suits, saris and lehengas.

On Friday, his employer asked him to collect the month’s salary and leave. “I have never witnessed such hostility in my entire career as a salesman,” Hussain told Scroll.

He said that his employer Chintu Jain was like family to him, but he was forced to act under pressure. “He faces the risk of social boycott if he does not remove us from our jobs,” Hussain said.

Jain told Scroll that he is “helpless”. “I have attended several meetings of the shopkeepers to negotiate a solution,” he said. “We have another meeting today. But we are clueless. We don’t know what to do and how to resolve this situation.”

He added: “I have three Muslim workers who have been with this shop for several years. It is painful to see what is happening.”

A Muslim employee who works at a readymade salwar-suit store said on the condition of anonymity that many shop owners were trying to diffuse the situation by temporarily letting go of their employees.

“I have worked in the same store for 18 years,” the worker said. “I am close to my employer. He asked me to stay at home for a few days until the situation becomes better.”

The 35-year-old worker earns Rs 20,000 a month and has no other employment opportunities outside the market. “All my life I have sold salwar suits,” he said.

‘Love jihad’ rumours

Moin Tawar’s bungalow in Sitlamata market is nearly a century old, he said. On the ground floor, Tawar has 12 shops that he has rented out to Hindus and Muslims. “We never differentiated between two communities in business,” said Tawar, who is Muslim.

His own store named “Tawar Sari” has been managed by a Hindu on rent since 2020. “I have not been asked to vacate since I own this plot,” Tanwar said. “But there are very few Muslim landowners like me. Most operate their business on rent. They are losing their livelihood.”

Tawar said the market has never witnessed any communal tensions. “But many are citing ‘love jihad’ as a reason to evict Muslims,” he added.

“Love jihad” is a term coined by Hindutva groups to allege a conspiracy by Muslim men to lure Hindu women into interfaith relationships with the aim of converting them to Islam.

At least three shopkeepers told Scroll that preventing “love jihad” was the main objective behind the diktat.

Hansraj Jain, who owns ‘Soni Sarees’, said the move to evict Muslims from the market is “actually a fight against jihad”.

“Young Muslim boys operate multiple fake accounts on Instagram,” Jain said. “They lure our girls. It is important to stop all kinds of funding to them, including their source of earning.”

Leeladhar Namdev, who runs Bhavya Tailoring Shop, said there have been rumours in the market about Muslim salesmen “misbehaving” with female customers. “That is why this issue has become big,” Namdev said. “Muslim boys are bringing disrespect to our market.”

A jewellery store owner who requested anonymity said a common aim among the business community is to keep Muslims away. “I heard of a case where a Muslim salesman took the phone number of a customer and started harassing her,” he claimed. “They are engaging in organised crime. Why should we take on risk and give them jobs in our store?”

Nizam Sabri, a 35-year-old salesman who has worked in a store in the market for two decades, said if a salesman misbehaves, he should be punished and fired. “But the entire community should not be made a scapegoat,” he said.

Sabri quickly added that stories of misconduct were “mere rumours”. He said: “It is an excuse to act against us.”

Advocate Zaid Pathan, a member of the Association for Protection of Civil Rights, said that although the decision to evict Muslims was sudden, Gaur was known for Hindutva politics. “He has attempted to strike communal discord in the past too,” Pathan alleged. “He has proposed to demolish mosques and protested against azaan.”

Arbaaz Shaikh, who is now out of business, said he planned to rent a shop in a Muslim-dominated neighborhood of the city. “But my sales will fall,” he said. “Most customers in the city come to Sitlamata market to buy fabric.”

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