Frederick Noronha
The other day, while on Facebook, I went through this unusual experience. A rights campaigner, who happened to be Christian, was making a number of points on politics and religion. He was being boldly critical about the future of Indian democracy, the role of religion (or, rather, what we in South Asia term communalism) in politics, and the risks of a theocratic rule of sorts in the 21st century.
The points sounded logical enough (at least to my own set of biases). But with every point he made, things only got polarised further. Among his ‘friends’, some went on to support him while others were obviously anguished by what he was saying, and retorted rudely. Some 49 shares and scores of comments latter, the discussion only kept getting further fuelled, further emotionalised.
It suddenly struck me: sometimes silence is the best argument. Arguments can oftentimes be judged on the basis of who is making them. This makes the entire effort counter-productive.
So I took the liberty of jumping into the fray, unsolicited, and suggesting to my campaigner friend: “The more you protest, the more it makes it seem as if the future of India is a majority-versus-minority tug-of-war. This, it definitely isn’t.”
The ‘secularism’ debate (or, as some call it, the ‘sickular’ debate) has been going on for a long time now. Politicians of all hues have tried their luck with it.
As a young reporter, I was shocked to see an also young Rajiv Gandhi setting the cat among the pigeons with his government ordering open the locks on the Babri Masjid gates around 1989, just in time for the elections. That was counter-productive, in electoral terms at least. Half a decade earlier, his mother played her own form of community-based politics and paid the price, with her life. The 1984 elections though resulted in a windfall win for Rajiv, with the polarisation really helping his party.
But one thing about the debate is really worrying. Instead of seeing this as a discussion about the future of India, it is portrayed as one about the fate of the minorities in India. This is not only misleading, but very inaccurate. The stakes are far higher.
Everyone has seen the effect of politics suffused by religion around the world (regardless which religion that is). All organised religions, and ‘unorganised’ ones too, have got tempted at trying their hands in the world of politics. Of deploying their clout to other ends. We’ve had Sikh sants and Christian religious try their hand at the world of politics, sometimes with disastrous effects. Even Sri Lanka’s ethnic war was based on religion, involving the supposedly peaceful Buddhist faith too.
At times, religious leaders have tried to act as the sane voice of counsel. A Pope Francis (but not his predecessors) and a Swami Agnivesh come to mind. They speak out against what they see as wrong, without being players in party politics themselves, and while taking care not to set up the followers of one religion against the other.
At other times, priests have played the role of Machiavellian politicians. It is also a fact that some politicians who have deployed religion for their own sectarian cause are not great believers in religion themselves. This has been true of a Jinnah, a Hitler, a Salazar or even, more recently, a Donald Trump. But that is another issue.
Of course, it’s easy to get worked up when we’re criticising someone else. The other reality is that it sometimes becomes tough to distinguish between the hype and the reality; while everyone is focussed on the more sensational aspects of life (those which make it to the television headlines), a number of more important but less noticed changes take place.
So, the side-show of religion-based theatricals actually cover and conceal more pressing issues. Like making it tougher to regulate or even know about corporate funding to politicians, the contentious universal tracking of biometric and demographic data through Aadhaar, or even pressures on free expression in places like universities, cinema and at times even the media.
But the point that is important is that ‘secularism’ (however we define it) should not be converted into a majority-versus-minority debate. It’s really for the majority community to decide for itself whether the Rightwing politics of religion serves its cause or otherwise. ‘How are the minorities getting affected’ is not the major issue here. If it becomes, it would only willy-nilly helps a further polarisation, which is just the smokescreen that those who want to skew the debate are looking out for.
Recently, after the unexpected electoral result in Uttar Pradesh, the online journal Scroll.in commented that after the results the “Muslim community debates whether their very presence in the political arena has become problematic for Hindus”.
This might be a minority-within-the-minority opinion, but former Rajya Sabha MP Mohammed Adeeb was quoted as saying in Lucknow that the community should “keep away from electoral politics for a while and, instead, concentrate on education”. He has said this some months before the elections itself. Adeeb’s argument was not for Muslims to stay off elections, but to stop imagining that that they could decide which party comes to power in Uttar Pradesh.
In a Goa where it can sometimes be tempting to divide legislators on the basis of the religion of their birth, such issues need to be raised too. Does political power have anything to do with religious backgrounds? Can religious communities expect politicians to act with community interests in mind? Who chooses ‘community’ leaders, and how accountable are they?
Time, as the cliché goes, will tell. But public memory tends to be short too….