By Shariq Us Sabah
When the Indian constitution was being drafted, the word secular was not included in the preamble, but the nature of the constitution has always been completely secular. The idea of India differs from that of Pakistan, and the reason the Greater India had to settle for a partition because the different pockets of the nation could not be identified as belonging to Muslims or to Hindus. It was only when Muhammed Ali Jinnah demanded Pakistan and all possibilities for reconciliation were exhausted that Mahatma Gandhi accepted partition on the condition that the new India will be completely secular.
The Indian subcontinent is a historical case of tolerance, mutual respect for religion, and co-existence. And for thousands of years of Indian history, minorities ruled the majority, yet the nation was free of polarisation. The beauty of India is such that no force that tried to divide the nation on religious grounds survive. The Mughals ruled for over 300 years, but the decline of the empire set in when Aurangzeb imposed jizya, a tax on Hindus. Then came the British. When they attempted to destroy religious harmony, the response was a sepoy mutiny. Though unsuccessful, Muslims and Hindus fought together shoulder to shoulder.
Understanding Indian secularism
Indian secularism is different from the secularism of the West. In the West, they are neither theocratic nor do they recognise religion. However, Indian secularism is not anti-religious, rather a normative doctrine that seeks to realise a secular society that is devoid of either inter-religious or intra-religious domination. The Indian principle of secularism states that a state must not only refuse to be theocratic but also have no formal, legal alliance with any religion. The Indian secular state is committed to principles and goals that are at least partly derived from non-religious sources. Indian secularism ensures peace, religious freedom, and freedom from religious oppression, discrimination and exclusions, as well as inter-religious and intra-religious equality.
But communalism entered the nerves of India during the 1850s when the British used it as a policy to divide and rule. The British did not want to be the common enemy, and so created new ones. The British divided people on the lines of caste and religion, as well as region. Since then, India has been gripped under religious polarisation, and as a result, the social fabric of the country continues to be affected deeply.
Why religion is not the answer
It is unfair to blame a single political party for using religious propaganda and polarisation to win elections. Indian politics is far from clean and every party has used religion as a means to political ends, while some remain more voracious in their agenda for a ‘majority rule’ and dream for a ‘Hindu rashtra’. It is thus important to understand why Shashi Tharoor warns against India becoming a “Hindu Pakistan”.
We must discount that the comment was made by a politician. Instead, we must try to understand its mettle in the socio-eco-political context to truly understand the ill effects of having ‘religion’ as a state policy. In his latest book Reimagining Pakistan: Transforming a Dysfunctional Nuclear State, former Pakistani diplomat Husain Haqqani suggests that religion as a state policy promotes a mindset of denial and victimhood.
The impact of the dominance of religion in all spheres of life can best be understood through the example of Pakistani nuclear scientist Sultan Bashiruddin Mahmood, who proposed that all energy-related problems could be solved by taming the “djinns“ (the Aladdin kind) because they were made of fire. Many others lured by the limelight have delivered gems of medieval gibberish in the name of Islamic science. Pakistan is an intolerant state; it has seen a high number of incidents of state-sponsored genocide against minorities, and minorities (both inter- and intra-religious) constantly face unequal treatment. In fact, all wrongdoings in Pakistan are justified in the name of religion; when army generals in Pakistan topple the government, they do it under the pretext of religion.
Pakistan has immense potentiala great demographic dividend, rich mineral resource, and human resourcebut all of it remains untapped because the political masters use religion, and not competition, as a tool to win elections. Monetary development can occur only in a condition of peace and serenity. Communalism breeds a social climate of narrow-mindedness and viciousness that obstructs the growth of products and capital. The flow of work from profitable activities is redirected to inefficient activities; there is the huge devastation of public properties to spread the belief system that suits the political system. The inflow of foreign investments slows as the polarised environment scares off investors. Surely no country can develop economically while communal tensions rage.
Our strength remains plurality. Credit: Flickr/Sonali Ramola (CC BY 2.0)Culture of hate?
There have been many incidents of minorities being attacked by those associated with right-wing organisations. There has been a steep rise in the atrocities against Dalits. According to Indiaspend, there has been a 75% rise in cow-terror attacks, and an alarming rise in mob lynching, attacks by vigilantes, murder, attempt to murder, harassment, assault and gang-rape. Cases from Dadri, Dimapur, Chatra, Alwar, Jharkhand, Delhi, Pratapgarh, Thoubal, Jalwe, Srinagar, Una and other places have one thing in commonthey have been perpetrated by self-proclaimed “gau rakshaks” and are associated with some right-wing organisation. Here are some of the instances: there has been violence over a Facebook name; a 13-year-old boy was beaten for wearing ‘royal’ shoes; Dalit boys were stripped, beaten and paraded naked by villagers in Maharashtra for swimming in a well that belonged to an upper-caste family; three Dalit men were killed for sitting cross-legged; and a Dalit groom from Madhya Pradesh was threatened for riding a horse. Cow-related violence has spiked up dramatically from 5% of the total incidents (of lynching or public disorder) in 2012 to over 20% at the end of June 2017.
All of it is alarming, and is a clear law and order issue. But whose responsibility is to take care of law and order? Why have hatemongers become fearless?
Is this the culture that present-day India should promote?
Secularism above all
The party in power questions our nationalism, but it fails to show patriotism. There are many differences between nationalism and patriotism. The patriot is proud of the good things the country does, while the nationalist doesnt use the differentiation between good and bad. Any and every action by the country is good for a nationalist. Patriotism is backed by a feeling of responsibility, while nationalism is often mixed with fake pride and arrogance. This includes the citizen’s responsibility to his country, a country’s responsibility to its citizens, and the responsibility of a country and its citizens to the rest of the world. Nationalism in its hyper form becomes jingoism, a feeling that one’s country is superior to another in every aspect. Patriotism, on the other hand, is merely a feeling of admiration. Patriotism is passive, while nationalism is mostly aggressive. It is common knowledge that Indian freedom fighters were patriots and not nationalists.
Pluralism is acknowledging the fact that multiple power groups should exist and compete in a free and open marketplace of ideas, from which policies and law are generated to govern the society. In simple terms, people with diverse beliefs can live in the same society peacefully.
Keeping this view of a pluralistic society and the beliefs of Indian people mind, the constituent assembly developed the Indian version of secularism to means an equality of all religions. Thus secularism in India is a result of its pluralistic diversities, which has driven India for many years and should continue to do so.
Our constitution is enshrined with pluralistic values, and equality forms the basic structure of the constitution. We must strive to ensure that we remain patriots and not nationalists to retain our pluralistic nature.
Shariq Us Sabah is a writer and economist.