NATIONAL POLITICS
Sudheendra Kulkarni on BJP and the Muslim Indians
A very important aspect of its limited, albeit slowly growing social base is the wide gulf that separates the BJP and India's Muslim community. A recent article (May 7) had argued why the Muslim community, for its own good, needs to make a positive re-appraisal of the BJP to bridge this gulf as much as is possible. In this sequel, we Shail argue why the BJP too, for its own good, must play its part in bridging the Guli by taking a new, positive look at Indian Muslims and their predicament.
The starting point of the BJP's act of introspection has to be the realization that it cannot hope to govern the country with any degree of stability of efficacy by allowing a thick wall of misunderstanding, misapprehension and hostility to divide it from the vast majority of India's 110 million Muslims. The practical problems of dealing with large alienated social constituency are no doubt daunting. But there are far more weighty reasons why no notion of neglecting the Muslim community must even be entertained. First, it goes against the grain of democracy. But, more importantly, it does not square up with the BJP's own professed aim of strengthening the sense of substance of Indian nationalism. Of course, neither Vajpayee nor the so-called hardliner Advani, harbor any such notion of "doing without the Muslims". Yet, the fact is that the BJP leadership has failed so far to break the wall that divides the party from the Indian Muslims. Why?
In today's frenzied debate on secularism, few have noted the fact that, more than any systematic anti-Muslim campaign by the Sangh Parivar, it is the twin effect of the Congress leadership's anti-RSS tirade and the effective brainwashing by the Muslim religious leadership which has raised this wall of misunderstanding. If the Sangh Parivar has so far done little to demolish this wall, it is because it has allowed its stance towards the Muslim community to be determined by the reactive principle. When the weight of the adversarial campaign is very strong it is often human nature to simply react and not act. But today, nearly five decades after Independence, the Sangh Parivar is no longer a fringe phenomenon; it is a dominant socio-political power. It must, therefore, shift its response mechanism from the reactive gear to the active gear and initiate a fresh dialogue with the Indian Muslims. In this it will have to discard many attitudinal and behavioral patterns of the past which conform neither to the spiritual thrust of Hinduism nor to the nationalist underpinnings of Hindutva.
To begin, the leaders of the Sangh Parivar must show sincere appreciation and respect for the ethical and egalitarian content in the Islamic tradition. All great Hindus of our time, from Vivekananda to Gandhi, did so. They did so not for reasons of appeasement but because, as good Hindus, they were naturally open to noble thoughts from all sides.
Greater Muslim Representation
This is not to suggest that Hindu intellectuals should keep mum on the many undemocratic, unscientific and even bigoted aspects of the Islamic tradition - especially those that directly concern them, such as the entrenched, egregious and scripturally sanctioned thought behavior mode towards the "kafirs". But the Sangh Parivar's legitimate criticism of these things should not blind it to the ethical richness of Islam which creates much-needed God-consciousness in society.
A related issue is the Sangh Parivar's apprehensions about the extra-territorial bonds of Indian Muslims. The fact of the matter is that the origin, the geographical spread and the scriptural specificities of Islam make its adherents pre-disposed to taking a view of the religion- nation relationship that is different from the Hindus'. This is fact of history which does not lend itself to any fundamental change. The Sangh Parivar should recognize this fact and guide the Muslim community's integration into the national mainstream within the parameters of this fact. What this means is that the Indianization of Islam should in general be supported. What must also be recognized is that the extent and pace of Islam's Indianization depends on Hindu unity and the cultural and spiritual efflorescence of Hindu society.
Second, the Sangh Parivar has erred badly by not recognizing the undeniable contribution of Indian Muslims to our multi-hued national culture. From architecture to music and from poetry to pottery, much that makes any patriotic Indian proud has a distinctive Muslim stamp on it. It is plain and simple chauvinism to deny or be silent about this contribution. This attitude has understandably isolated the Sangh Parivar from Muslim intellectuals and masses. Every community feels proud of its own perception of shared history. The Muslim perception of history is no doubt problematic because of its association with notions of political conquest, cultural superiority and religious expansionism. But when today's Muslims find that a growing political force like the BJP shares none of their pride in even those past achievements which ought to make every Indian proud, they are bound to feel alienated from that party. A change in this attitude is necessary even for the success of Sangh Parivar's legitimate demand that Muslims too, for their past, should feel proud of India's non-Islamic cultural heritage.
What is true about architecture and artisanry is truer still about the Urdu language. Urdu originated on the Indian soil and has every right to claim from Indian nationalists the same kind of patronage and protection as ought to be received by other Indian languages. Muslim separatists of course had a vested interest in projecting.
