by Hilal Ahmed
It is clear that Savarkar, Golwalkar, the BJS and even Bhagwat make a clear distinction between Hindus and non-Hindus. A born Hindu, in this framework, would naturally qualify as a patriot, while non-Hindus would have to be Indianized (read Hinduized!).
Let us recapitulate the discussion by outlining the Hindutva imagination of the Muslims of India.
Types of Muslims: There are two kinds of Muslims in India—the foreigners (or racial), whose forefathers came from outside the territory called India, and the local Hindus, who were forcibly converted to Islam by the Muslim rulers.
Nature of Islamic ideas: Islam is the antithesis of Hindutva. Since it did not originate in the territory of India, it cannot be called ‘Indian’. The oneness of God does not allow Muslims to appreciate/imbibe Hindutva’s openness and religious plurality.
Influence of Islam: Islamic ideas influence both types of Muslims and encourage separatist tendencies. The partition of India strengthened this tendency.
Hindutva’s way out: Muslims should not change their mode of worship, but they should adhere to the core Indian/Hindutva values.
What should Muslims do to become truly Indian?
Who are you—a Muslim or an Indian? This has been the most dominant and straightforward question for Muslims in postcolonial India. Interestingly, this abstract question has been translated in a number of different ways over the years. I have divided these questions into five categories to make sense of the term Indianization. A few examples:
The Indianization of Islam
Why do you worship facing the Kaaba as it is outside India?
Why don’t you visit Hindu temples as many Hindus visit shrines and dargahs?
Why don’t you stop azan as it disturbs Hindus?
Why do you need mosques when you can offer namaz anywhere?
Why do you offer namaz on roads as it disturbs the traffic?
Why do you need graveyards as there is a shortage of land?
Why don’t you remove a few verses of the Quran as these verses are anti-national in nature?
Why don’t give up claims over historic mosques as most of the mosques were built by Muslim rulers by destroying temples?
The Indianization of Muslim everyday life
Why don’t you say ‘Vande Mataram’?
Why don’t you say ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’?
Why don’t you come to celebrate Hindu festivals as these constitute Indian culture?
Why do you come to celebrate Hindu festivals—to lure Hindu girls?
Why do you celebrate the victory of Pakistan in a cricket match against India?
Why don’t you have Indian Hindu/Sanskrit names for your children?
The Indianization of Muslim family life
Why do you marry four times?
Why don’t you use contraceptives?
Why do Muslim men marry Hindu women?
Why don’t you appreciate a wedding between a Hindu man and a Muslim woman?
The Indianization of Muslim eating habits
Why don’t you stop killing/eating the cow as it’s a sacred animal for us?
Why don’t you give up eating meat as it hurts the sentiments of vegetarian Hindus/Indians?
Why do you take pride in foreign dishes such as biryani?
Why do you want Islamic religious schools as it goes against the fundamental ethos of this land?
The Indianization of Muslim politics
Why do you want Muslim personal law?
Why do you want to be called a ‘minority’?
Why don’t you oppose Islamic terrorism and Pakistan’s involvement in Kashmir?
Why do you want the protection of Urdu—when it’s not an Indian language?
Why don’t you give up your claim over the Babri Masjid as it’s a sentimental issue for Hindus?
Why do you want reservation as it is only meant for reforming Hindu society?
This list will always remain incomplete because it is based on an inherent contradiction between Indian Muslims and the various conceptions of Hindutva. Even if all Muslims start singing ‘Vande Mataram’ wholeheartedly, change their names, remove a few verses from the Quran, they won’t become a Hindu/Indian/patriot, as there is a strong apprehension about the process of Indianization itself! Indianization cannot change the blood and cannot reverse the historical tragedy called conversion!
Let me come back to the main question: Why does Hindutva need Muslims? The core of Hindutva of all kinds is based on historically constituted, anti-Muslim rhetoric. Hindutva ideologues offer a subjugated imagination of the medieval Indian past as a ‘historic rupture’. This pessimistic Hindu history is used to celebrate the courage of a few selective Hindu heroes such as Shivaji and Maharana Pratap to denounce Muslim rulers, especially Aurangzeb and Akbar. The Hindus of independent India are called upon to erase this historical injustice by asserting their anti-Muslim Hinduness.
The Muslims of India are important for the survival of this political imagination for two reasons. First of all, they could be shown as the children of those who once humiliated and defeated the Hindus. The rhetorical expressions for Muslims, such as ‘Babar ki aulad’ (progeny of Babar), emerge out of this Hindutva anxiety. Since it is not possible to get rid of Muslims completely, it is easier for Hindutva to make them a permanent ‘other’.
Secondly, the evocation of Muslim identity also helps Hindutva hide its ambiguities and internal contradictions. The RSS’s criticism of Hindutva in the 1960s and its wholehearted appropriation of it in the 1990s survives because of its conventional anti-Muslim position. Similarly, the BJP’s unclear position on its stated political philosophy—integral humanism—could not become a political issue in the wake of the party’s so-called submission to the ideology of Hindutva even without recognizing it as a fundamental ideological tenant.
Yes, Bhagwat is right. Hindutva without Muslims is meaningless!
Source: Vikram Nayak.
PART II
UNPACKING SIYASI MUSLIMS
5
Muslims as a Minority
Muslim affairs versus minority affairs
In her short-lived career as minister for minority affairs, Najma Heptulla made three very strong arguments about the status of Muslims as a minority.
Immediately after taking charge of the ministry, she clarified that Muslim affairs should not be confused with the issues and concerns of the ‘minorities’. She said: ‘This is not the ministry for Muslim affairs, this is the ministry of Minority affairs [. . .] Muslims are not minorities. Parsis are. We have to see how we can help them so that their numbers do not diminish.’1
Her second argument was related to the growing alienation of Muslims after 2014. Heptulla argued that Muslim alienation had always been an issue in India. Accusing the Congress of vote-bank politics, Heptulla said, ‘It is not that today Muslims are feeling alienated. Muslims have been feeling alienated since Independence, because they have been relegated to such [a] backward situation.’2
Heputlla’s third argument was about Muslim reservation. She said, ‘This government is not making promises, it’s doing the work. It’s making Muslims capable enough to do something for themselves and not depend on this reservation. And reservation on the basis of religion is totally wrong and it should not happen.’3
These three comments certainly go against the so-called secular political correctness that was established during the UPA 1 and UPA 2 periods. Although it is true that Najma Heptulla followed the party line and did not deviate from the unspoken stand of the BJP on Muslim isolation, there is an element of truth in her observations.
Her distinction between two related terms, ‘Muslims’ and ‘minority’, is absolutely valid. ‘Muslim’ as a religious community as well as a census category is technically different from the constitutional term ‘minority’. The argument that Muslim marginalization is a postcolonial Indian phenomenon created and nurtured by the Congress elite is politically justifiable. And her assertion that reservation on the basis re
ligion is unlawful is also technically correct.
Yet, the manner in which Muslims are described as a minority, even by Heptulla, is problematic.
There is a positive portrayal of their minority status, which celebrates the triumph of Indian secularism. The protection of Muslims’ religious and culture rights are often evoked to underline the success of the ‘unity in diversity’ thesis.
However, there is an equally powerful negative depiction of Muslims as a minority. It is argued that minority rights given to Muslims go against the principle of equality. The minority status of Muslims, it is alleged, legitimizes the politics of appeasement and encourages separatist tendencies.
This oversimplified formulation raises two sets of issues.
The first set of questions is technical in nature, such as asking what is the legal–constitutional meaning of the term ‘minority’? And what is the criterion to identify a minority?
The second set of issues is political. If Muslims are seen as a national minority, shall we call the Hindus of India a ‘national majority’? And, for that reason, is it legitimate to interpret the recognition of Muslim distinctiveness as a form of political appeasement? This is what this chapter aims to discuss.
Undefined minorities and Muslims
It is worth noting that the minority–majority in colonial India were always recognized as permanent entities, especially on a religious basis. Hence, Hindus as the majority and Muslims and other non-Hindu groups as minorities were recognized as the legitimate stakeholders. This communalization of the minority–majority eventually led to the Partition.
Recognizing this deeply ingrained communal impulse, the Constituent Assembly of India worked out a highly undefined and fluid conception of a minority. The Constitution offers us two attributes of a minority group: the distinctiveness of a minority group in relation to majority culture (Articles 29–30), and the diversity of minorities, which means the recognition of various religious as well as linguistic communities as minorities (Articles 25, 26, 350).
The first feature of a minority categorically stresses upon the fact that a minority, being a numerical expression, cannot be attributed to any particular social group permanently. In this sense, Muslims, Sikhs and Christians ‘become a minority’ on a contextual basis. Even Hindus can be called a religious minority in Punjab, Kashmir and Nagaland.
The second constitutional feature suggests that apart from religion, language and culture should also be taken into consideration when defining a minority. That is the reason why we have constitutionally recognized linguistic and cultural minorities in India.
The distinction Nehru makes between the communalism of majority and the communalism of minority is very relevant here. In the 1950s, the Nehru government enacted the Hindu Code Bill, but no such legislative initiatives were proposed to reform the Muslim personal law. Nehru was severely criticized for encouraging Muslim appeasement. In the open session of the All India Congress Committee, on 11 May 1958, Nehru responded to these criticisms. He said:
The communalism of the majority is far more dangerous than the communalism of the minority because it wears the garb of nationalism. We have thus communalism ingrained in us and it comes out quite quickly at the slightest provocation and even decent people begin to behave like barbarians when this communalism is aroused in them . . .’ (Noorani 2003, 316)
This distinction between minority and majority communalism underlines Nehru’s assertion that the distinctiveness of a minority is a constitutional commitment; hence, institutions should be able to deal with the anxieties and aspirations of minorities, which might take a communal overtone.
At the same time, Nehru also made another very important explanation. He sought to clarify the distinction between constitutional adherence to the unity and integrity of the Indian republic and the notion of Indianization—an idea that had been propagated by Hindu nationalists, mainly by the BJS in the 1950s.
This clarification had certain institutional manifestations as well. The Nehru government was keen to establish certain new forms of institutions to implement what was rhetorically known as ‘unity in diversity’.
By the early 1960s, the idea of having a special institution to deal with the question of national integration emerged as a political necessity. The creation of the National Integration Council (NIC) in 1961 was the obvious outcome.
The official and stated objectives for which the NIC was constituted were not entirely related to the problems and anxieties of the religious minorities. The official statement of the National Integration Conference, 1961, defines national integration:
National integration is a psychological and educational process involving the development of a feeling of unity, solidarity and cohesion in the hearts of the people, a sense of common citizenship and a feeling of loyalty to the nation.4
Yet, the grievances of the minority were given a priority and it was suggested that the NIC ‘should give early consideration to the setting up of machinery for the examination and redress of grievances of minorities’.
It is important to note here that the proceedings of the National Integration Conference, 1961, as well as agenda items discussed by the NIC focused primarily on the problems of integration with regard to linguistic minorities. The issues of religious minorities were discussed under the heading of ‘communalism’!
This discussion brings us to two crucial technical points:
Technically, any Indian community—religious as well as linguistic—may be identified as a minority on case-by-case basis. Muslims, thus, cannot technically be called a permanent minority in constitutional terms.
Politically, however, the colonial discourse of minority/majority as Hindu communalism versus Muslim separatism continued to survive in postcolonial India. Muslims were always addressed as a ‘permanent minority’ by the political elite, especially in the realm of competitive electoral politics.
Muslims and the Minorities Commission (1977–91)
In the 1977 elections, the Congress was defeated by the newly established Janata Party (JP) and the first non-Congress government at the Centre was established. The JP, which had evoked the ‘persecution of minorities’ as one of the main political arguments against Indira Gandhi’s Emergency regime, established the Minorities Commission in 1978. In the official notification, it was noted:
Despite the safeguards provided in the Constitution and the laws in force, there persists amongst the minorities a feeling of inequality and discrimination. In order to preserve secular traditions and to promote national integration, the Government of India attaches the highest importance to the enforcement of the safeguards provided for the minorities and is of the firm view that effective institutional arrangements are urgently required for the effective enforcement and implementation of all the safeguards provided for the minorities in the Constitution, in Central and state laws, and in government policies and administrative schemes enunciated from time to time [. . .] The Government [. . .] has [. . .] resolved to set up a Minorities Commission to safeguard the interests of minorities whether based on religion or language.5
To make sense of the status of this non-statutory entity called the Minorities Commission, we must understand the technical distinction between statutory bodies and non-statutory bodies.
A statutory body derives its powers from a law passed by the Parliament, while a non-statutory body comes into existence by an executive order. Statutory bodies are also different from institutional ones called ‘constitutional bodies’. The constitutional bodies derive their authority from the Constitution itself. In other words, constitutional bodies are formed by the Constitution which helps the government run properly.
The Minorities Commission, in this sense, was a non-statutory institution which came into existence through an official notification. It did not have the adequate legal weight to respond to the identifiable issues of minorities. Nevertheless, this commission was entrusted with the following functions:
(a) To evaluate the wor
king of the various safeguards provided in the Constitution for the protection of minorities and in the laws passed by the Union and the state governments;
(b) To make recommendations with a view to ensuring the effective implementation and enforcement of all the safeguards and laws;
(c) To undertake a review of the implementation of the policies pursued by the Union and the state governments with respect to the minorities;
(d) To look into the specific complaints regarding the deprivation of the rights of and safeguards for the minorities;
(e) To conduct studies, research and analyses on the question of avoidance of discrimination against minorities;
(f) To suggest appropriate legal and welfare measures in respect of any minority;
(g) To serve as a National Clearance House for information in respect of the conditions of the minorities; and
(h) To make periodical reports at prescribed intervals to the government.6
The creation of the commission should also be seen in relation to the commissions constituted for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. It is worth noting that the National Commission for Scheduled Castes and the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes were not created as two distinct constitutional bodies.
These commissions were initially established by the notification of the government in 1978. However, over the course of time, it evolved into a constitutional body. The Minorities Commission had a different trajectory. Despite a number of constitutional interventions, the commission could not attain constitutional status during the JP regime. A bill in this regard was tabled by the government in the Lok Sabha in 1978, which could not become a law and lapsed on two different occasions.