Open Forum
New Delhi, 12 August 2008
Muslim Factor In Politics
HALT SELECTIVE
SECULARISM
By Prakash Nanda
The nation’s focus may well be on the troubles in Jammu and Kashmir, but a
comparable unrest is all encompassing the State of Assam. In a sense, the problems in the two States
are compounded by one factor – the factor of religion. In Kashmir,
when the Ghulam Nabi Azad government transferred a piece of land to facilitate
the safety of the devotees’ yatra to the Lord Amarnath shrine for just two months
every year, it was interpreted as an act against Muslims.
The criticism against Azad’s decision by the agitationists
and politicians in the Valley is based on the spurious argument that the land
transfer (the land owned by the government was transferred to a body run by the
government) would change the demographic composition in Kashmir
and reduce the Muslims into a minority!
In other words, the message that the agitationists, including top
Kashmir politicians, whom our Delhi-based intelligentsia and media project as
great secularists, convey is that they are Muslims first and Kashmir is
essentially for Muslims.
In Assam,
the Muslim factor is aggravating the problem the other way round. The State is literally invaded
demographically by illegal Bangladeshi immigrants. And, this is something both the State
judiciary and the Supreme Court have concluded repeatedly in recent years. In fact, recently the Guwahati High Court
rued that “It can happen only in Assam”,
while castigating the authorities over a Pakistani national entering Assam from Pakistan
through Bangladesh,
roaming around the Indian soil, but also contested an election.
Sadly, majority of our political parties and intelligentsia
are least bothered. The ruling Congress doesn’t dare take any action because
doing so would hurt the Muslims and their votes. In the name of secularism, it
pretends as if the problem doesn’t exist, despite growing intense popular anger
all over Assam
against the illegal immigrants.
This apart, the Muslim
factor is also hampering our efforts to fight terrorism, notwithstanding that India is one of
the worst victims of terror. In order to protect our so-called secularism, we
cannot frame special laws, something which most countries the world-over have
done, to fight terror. Why? Simply, because any such law will be branded as
anti-Muslim.
Worse, even the
conventional law-enforcement mechanisms are not being allowed to be used under
political pressure if the members of the Muslim community are suspect. The police
force in various States, the counter-terror veterans in the intelligence
agencies and even the Army have given enough hints that their hands are tied in
apprehending the Islamic terrorists these days.
It is true that overwhelming majority of the
Muslims in the world are not terrorists.
But it is equally true that overwhelming majority of the terrorists in
the world happen to be Muslims. Of
course, terrorists are found in all religions.
There are Hindu terrorists in Sri Lanka (LTTE) and India (ULFA in Assam and Naxalites all over). There are Christian terrorists in many parts
of Africa and Latin America. And, there have been Sikh terrorists in India and Canada.
However, there is a fundamental difference. Unlike
terrorists of other religions, Islamic terrorists, invariably, justify their
actions in the name of their religion.
And unlike terrorists of other religions, whose goals are political and
country-specific, Islamic terrorists have an international dimension. They all
believe in Wahabism that talks of the absolute supremacy of Islam over
all other religions. They fight to strengthen their ultimate goal of
establishing the Islamic domination all over the world. If they die in the process, they are “confident”
of going to “paradise” of their God.
Wahabism is totally opposed to Sufism, the main guiding force of Muslims
in the Indian subcontinent for ages that talked of peaceful and harmonious
co-existence with other religions. But the vote-bank politics in recent years
has become so pervasive that our politicians and intelligentsia are totally
defensive and often apologetic to the champions of the xenophobic Wahabism that
is dividing not only the Indians but also other “world citizens”. See the way some of our leading politicians
defended the SIMI last week until the Supreme Court stayed the verdict of a
lower court removing the ban on the extremist outfit.
The Muslim factor in Indian politics has become so
entrenched that foreign policy issues are now being seen in pro-Muslim or
anti-Muslim terms. The much-debated India-US nuclear agreement is a case in
point. A leading CPM member and BSP
supremo Mayawati, who also happens to be the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh,
have openly described the nuclear agreement as anti-Muslim.
What has a nuclear agreement between India and the US got to
do with the Muslims and their religious convictions? And why those opposed to the deal are doing
so in the name of Muslims? If the deal
is really bad, then let us point out how this is against India’s long-term
interests and how this is not really going to help the country meet its growing
energy needs, as some enthusiastic supporters of the arrangement claim.
With the country
poised to celebrate the 61st year of its Independence, it is high
time that we all see ourselves as Indians, not in terms of our caste, community
and ethnicity. That is the true meaning
of secularism. But then, unfortunately
the fact remains that our politicians and intelligentsia have reduced secularism
just to a slogan. They find in it a
panacea to explain and justify all their deeds (or misdeeds).
For years, you may
be in the ranks of the “communal” BJP, Shiv Sena and Akalis, but if you change
sides then the best way of explaining this is your discovering virtues of
“secularism”. You or your party may have
been in the alliance with the “communal parties” in the past, but if you or
your party is now in the other side, it is because of your concerns for minorities
and convictions to “secular politics”!
Ironically, “secularism” has been never defined by its
champions in India. Though the 42nd
Amendment in 1975 by Indira Gandhi’s Congress Government did incorporate the
word “secularism” in our Constitution, it did not define what secularism was. Ironically, her Congress party, which
dominated the then Rajya Sabha in 1978, foiled an attempt to actually define
secularism as “equal respect to all religions” by defeating an amendment-Bill
that had already been cleared in the Lok Sabha during the Janata regime of
Morarji Desai.
Thus, in the
absence of a clear definition of secularism in our political parlance, we will
continue to witness “communal politicians” becoming “secular” overnight and
vice versa, with everything depending on the political convenience of the
parties and their supporters. Last year,
the UPA and its then supporters in the Left Block were singularly guided by the
principle of secularism in electing Ms. Pratibha Patil as the country’s President.
They were against making the then Vice President B S Shekhawat the head of State,
as that would have adversely affected their “secular character”.
In fact, the Left
reportedly did not agree to the candidature of not lesser a person than the
country’s home minister, Shivraj Patil, the first choice of the Congress for
the post of President. Apparently, Patil was found wanting in his commitment to
secularism since he was a devotee of Satya Sai Baba! He also had invited the displeasure of the
Left because he, as the Speaker of the Lok Sabha in the early 90s, had allowed
the “communal” BJP “too much time” for airing its views in the House! How
absurd. It is time that we define secularism.---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
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