FROM THE EDITOR’ DESK
Advertently or inadvertently the Supreme Court has provided a political bonanza to the Bharatiya Janata Party on the eve of the General Election, 1996.
The BJP leadership has long been advocating the establishment of Hindu Rashtra, though, by virtue of the Constitution and the Law of the land, it has been forced to pay lip service to the principle of Secularism and expressing loyalty to the Secular State. It has tried to bridge over the obvious dichotomy and resolve the clear contradiction between the Hindu State and the Secular State by propounding the philosophy of Hindutva and defining Hinduism as an all-inclusive 'Dharma'. Thus, according to the Sangh Parivar, the Hindu Dharma is the eternal religion of mankind while all other religions are mere sects with their own 'forms of worship'. In its generosity, the Sangh Parivar offers to embrace the followers of all religions and the former President of the BJP has gone to the extent of defining Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains as Mohammadi Hindus, Issawi Hindus, Nanaki (or bearded) Hindus, Buddavi Hindus and Mahabiri Hindus. Taken to its logical limit, are all those who call themselves Hindus be redefined as 'Hindu Hindus"? When asked this question, Joshi had no answer.
There is yet another problem with the term 'Hindu'. The term, as defined by Savarkar and as propagated by the Sangh Parivar, does not cover everyone those born in India, it includes only those among them who follow an "indigenous "religion and consider India not only their motherland (or fatherland, as Savarkar put it) but as 'Punyabhoomi, 'place of worship', Muslims, Christians, Zoroastrians are thus put beyond the pale. On the other hand, the Sangh Parivar adopting the Goebbebsian technique goes on repeating the lie that it regards all Indians as Hindus and therefore equal in the legal sense, irrespective of creed, caste, language, race etc.
There is yet another problem. The Constitution defines the term Hindu in a restrictive sense. One wonder why the Supreme Court omitted any reference to the Constitution which speaks of religious minorities and specially defines the Sikhs as Hindu for the specific purpose of bringing the Sikhs belonging to the Scheduled Castes, within the purview of reservation, as a recompense for originally proposed reservation in legislature and services for all minorities. Indeed the Constitutional Order keeps out non-Hindus which explains the genesis of the demand of the Christian Dalits to be included in the list of Scheduled Castes and of Hindu Dalits not to be excluded if they opt out of Hinduism and embrace Buddhism or Christianity or Islam - i.c. a religion other the Hinduism, in exercise of freedom of religion and of consciences enshrined in the Constitution.
The concept of Secular State is founded on the multiplicity of religions in our country. If everyone is a Hindu, the society is mono-religious. There is no question of the state being neutral in inter-religious Conflicts of interest or disputes, of its being non- aligned towards or equidistant to all religions in all its dispensations, of its tilting in favour of one or the other. Howsoever, flawed in practice, a secular state has to adhere to and follow these precepts.
Moreover, if everyone is a Hindu, there is no religious majority and there are no religious minorities at the national or state levels. Yet the same BJP cries hoarse in favour of real and imagined grievances of the Hindu 'minority' in the state of J&K (or in Pakistan or in Bangladesh or in any Muslim country). On the other hand, the Sangh Parivar or the BJP has not been known ever to shed a tear when Muslim Indians are massacred or deprived of employment and livelihood or discriminated against, humiliated. Furthermore if the Hindus living abroad are Hindus, what are the Muslims and Christians and Buddhists and Sikhs living abroad? No doubt Hinduism is an Indo-centric religion but if there is no distinction between Hinduism and Bharatiyata, there are all Hindus living abroad, whatever their national status, Indians? Is there a Hindu, sorry, Indian Diaspora and will the Indian state, like Israel, which is frankly Zoionist, open its doors and grant a right to return to all Indians?
The deeper one analyzes the Savarkar - Sangh Parivar's equation of Hindu Hood and Indianness, of Hinduism and India, of Hindutva and Bharatiyata, the more complicated the conundrum becomes and the less one finds it possible to apply it to real life.
The Supreme Court has, in its wisdom, upheld these equations, albeit, on a philosophical plane. We should be grateful to the Supreme Court for this mercy. But should the Hon'ble Judges engage in unnecessary obiter and pen uninvited theses as if they were research scholars or pure academicians, shut up in their ivory towns distant and aloof from real life. The Supreme Court was dealing with an electoral contest in which appeal to religion attracts legal penalties. Are the candidates and their supporters, on one hand, and the electorate on the other, engaging in an academic or scholarly dialogue or debate, defining each term with philosophical profundity, razor sharp logic or semantic accuracy? No, they do not. In the give-and-take in the market place of politics, what matters is the ordinary meaning as currently understood and not as propounded in books of philosophy or encyclopaedias or even dictionaries and everyone understands what is meant when terms like Hindus, Hindutva or Hindu Rashtra are used. In the language of contemporary politics, which has been deeply communalised, these terms not only mean that the purveyor is pro-Hindu but that he is against non- Hindus, that he advocates (not hopes for) the establishment of Hindu Raj, the rule of the Hindu majority and the sub-ordination, if possible denationalisation, nay, even forcing out on pain of liquidation of the religious minorities. The salesmen of Hindu Rashtra are not selling a way of life, the eternal dharma of wisdom and tolerance.
It is amazing that the Supreme Court cannot visualise or even catch the spirit of the political campaign, the tone, the over-tone and the undertone of the electoral discourse, the anger, the distrust, the hatred, the violence that is sought to be incited by the purveyors of Hindu Rashtra and Hindutva.
And the Supreme Court, in its wisdom, not only exonerates such incitement against the secular order, against the fundamental structure, the very foundation of the Republic but provides the demolition squad with philosophical tools and ideological justification to carry on the nefarious enterprise, even more vigorously and in peace and in freedom from all legal restraint.
The Indian State, as à secular state, makes and most make a clear distinction among various religions whose followers inhabit the land, refrain from considering one as good and the others as bad, one as virtuous and the others as vicious, one as superior and the others as inferior, one as INDIAN and the others as non-Indian! The Indian State must protect the religious minorities from the permanent tyranny of the religious majority, against absorption and assimilation, against coercion and violence, against fear and hatred incited by the unchecked articulations of the religious right, the extremist fringe, the chauvinist groups and the fundamentalist parties, through their anti-secular, anti-democratic, anti-constitutional ravings and rantings, particularly at the time of elections.
No doubt Hinduism and Hindutva can be defined in universalistic and humane terms but that is the mask behind which lurks the revanchist mind and the fascist face, distorted by anger and revenge. The face must be unmasked by all those who believe in a civil society and in the destiny of our country to provide a model of peaceful coexistence for a multi-cultural, multi-religious, multi-racial, multi-linguistic and multi-cultural 'one world".
For long have Advani, Joshi and Co. preached Cultural Nationalism. Not surprisingly the Sangh Parivar, the BJP in particular, feels elated with joy. But all other political parties have been shocked by this judgement of the Supreme Court and are worried by its short and long-term fall-out.
Indian Culture cannot be reduced to Hindu Culture, just as 5000 years of Indian history cannot be capsuled as Hindu History or the History of the Hindu People. The Indian Reople are a bigger category then the Hindu people and a fraction, howsoever big, cannot be equal to the whole.
Mr. A.G. Noorani, in his inimitable style, has analysed this judgement from the legal angle and suggested its review. Many political parties have also demanded a review by a Constitution Bench. Such a review must be undertaken urgently before the BJP reaps an electoral harvest, by openly exploiting the religiosity of our Hindu citizens and by appealing, without let or hindrance, to their religious sentiments and by bringing out into the open the under-currents of communalism that, thanks to our history, our educational system and our politics, unfortunately continue to flow across our mental loudspeaker.
And one final appeal to the Hon'ble Judges of the Supreme Court. Please act as judges and interpret our Constitution and our Laws. Please do not set yourself as an academic teachers or political theorists or religious pundits. No more obiter, if you please!
New Delhi
1 January, 1996
SYED SHAHABUDDIN
