Hindu hard-liners protest Valentine's Day in India
It was hardly a Hallmark moment.
Members of the Hindu nationalist Shiv Sena party burn Valentine's Day cards as they protest against the import of foreign celebrations on Indian soil in New Delhi, India.
As a Valentine's Day card smoldered, more than 100 members of the Hindu extremist group Shiv Sena gathered in central New Delhi chanted "Death to Valentine's Day" and "People who celebrate Valentine's Day should be pelted with shoes!"
Valentine's Day has in the past two decades made strong inroads in India as the country has slowly opened itself up to the outside world – its economic boom bringing in not just foreign investment, but also aspects of Western culture virtually unknown here a quarter-century ago.
Across the country, stores stocked heart-shaped balloons and chocolates, restaurants offered Valentine's Day specials and young lovers found refuge from prying eyes in the parks.
It's a state of affairs that enrages Hindu and Muslim hard-liners, who on Wednesday vented just as they do every Valentine's Day -_ burning cards, holding rallies and even threatening to beat couples caught canoodling in public, a strict no-no for those who claim to defend traditional Indian values.
"This is a conspiracy to misguide the young people of our country," said Jai Bhagwan Goel, chief of the Shiv Sena's north India branch.
In his hand the card, with its image of a Victorian couple pictured in a tepid peck under a parasol, went up in flames.
"We have come to know that in America, even unmarried girls as young as 11 or 12 years have become mothers … and every second man there is divorced," Goel told reporters after reducing several greeting cards to a small pile of ash. "This is their culture – it cannot be accepted here."
Goel and his indignant followers left soon after when about 60 riot police stopped them from advancing on nearby restaurants offering Valentine's Day specials.
For the day, the Hindu hard-liners found themselves, unusually, on the same side as Islamic separatist groups in Indian-controlled Kashmir, a predominantly Muslim region in the Himalayas.
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