The Hindu : A diseased politics

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Feb 20, 2003

Opinion

Opinion - Leader Page Articles

A diseased politics

By Sunil Dutta

Hindu extremists seem to have embarked on the same strategy as the Muslim League did in 1940-46. A holocaust had resulted then from such divisive politics.

THE BJP victory in Gujarat has a striking parallel with colonial India's provincial elections in 1937. It was the rolling effect of 1937 in which political opportunists and fundamentalists joined forces for pathologically divisive politics that ended in the Partition. In 1937, the Muslim League failed miserably in the provincial elections. The results showed that the party claiming to represent Muslims did not speak for them — it received just 4.8 per cent of the Muslim vote even with separate electorates for Muslims and Hindus instituted by the British! The Congress, though dominated by Hindus but still largely secular in nature, swept the elections. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, supreme leader of the Muslim League, who started as a rising star in the Congress with impeccable secular credentials became marginalised and his party appeared on the verge of extinction.

The overwhelming victory boosted the Congress' claim as the representative of all Indians (a rebuke for the Muslim League which the Congress claimed was nothing more than a clique of wealthy Muslims with a communal bent). The Congress leaders were in no mood to compromise with Jinnah who (quite incorrectly at that point and time) believed himself to be the sole spokesman of pre-colonial Indian Muslims.

Jinnah began the blatant use of religion to gain the support of the Muslim masses. He propounded his theory of Hindus and Muslims being "two separate nations" that could not live together and asked for the creation of Pakistan for Muslims by dividing India (in a rebuke to Jinnah's fanciful "two-nation" theory, Punjab, a Muslim-majority state, was being ruled by a Unionist Muslim Government in a coalition with Hindu and Sikh legislators in the early 1940s.) His party's incendiary slogan of "Islam in danger" created a tremendous rift in divided Indian society; cities and towns burned with communal violence.

Jinnah's chauvinistic propaganda and the contrived conflict so effectively mobilised the Muslim population that in just seven years, the Muslim League went from winning less than five per cent to over 75 per cent of the Muslim vote in the 1945 provincial elections (the Muslim League's overall share of the total vote was 27 per cent against 60 per cent for the Congress). It took only two more years for the country to be divided on the basis of religion.

Hindu extremists seem to have embarked on the same strategy as the Muslim League did in 1940-46. A holocaust had resulted then from such divisive politics. Partition resulted in the massacre of about two million Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs and displaced between 10 million and 15 million people from their homes. My own family was chased out of the village where it had lived for five centuries and several of my relatives were butchered.

At the dawn of the 21st century, the world stands on the brink of a nuclear war because of India's Partition wrought by religious extremists. There have been three major wars between India and Pakistan after their creation. Both the nations are riven by poor infrastructure, pathetic disregard for human rights and sectarian violence that shows no sign of abating.

After Jinnah's death Pakistan's downslide into religious extremism was inevitable. India, which inherited a substantial Muslim population, managed to keep Hindu fundamentalism in check for a while. Leaders such as Gandhi and Nehru insisted on Hindu-Muslim harmony. The Hindu Mahasabha and other fundamentalist Hindu organisations became hated after a Hindu extremist killed Gandhi. Sadly, Hindu extremism has been on the rise and the current situation in India is not unlike 1938 when the rallying cry of Islam in danger resulted in rivers of blood flowing in Punjab and Bengal. Members of the RSS and the VHP (incarnations of Hindu Mahasabha) have learnt effectively from their brethren in the Muslim League. Their rallying cry of "Hinduism in danger" from India's Muslims has worked wonders for the BJP.

In the December 2002 Gujarat Assembly elections, the BJP won an overwhelming victory by pitting Hindu against Muslim. The Hindu extremists' previous strategy of blaming Muslims for all the country's problems, never translated into electoral victories, although it did succeed in polarising the communities. However, Hindus, just like Muslims in 1945, seem more responsive to incendiary sloganeering of their religion being in danger. The BJP's victory in Gujarat comes over the bodies of a thousand innocent Muslims. Thousands of Muslims were driven from their homes. During the countdown to the elections, the BJP used incendiary slogans representing Hindus as victims of Muslims! The BJP's chief opponent, the Congress, refused to take an unequivocal stand against the former's religion-mongering.

There is no doubt that the BJP wants to replicate its success across the country on the wings of "Hindutva". There is a good possibility it will succeed in a nation that is 85 per cent Hindu. Many in India believe the existing divisions among Hindus would preclude replication of the Gujarat results across the nation. This is a dangerous attitude that ignores how well a perceived common enemy helps overcome differences. Hindu India showed how well it can be organised in 1990 when fundamentalists rallied common people in the name of Lord Ram and led them to the destruction of the Babri Masjid in 1992. History is the guide on how a deeply divided Muslim population in British India rallied behind the flag of "Islam in danger". The entire propaganda in the late 1930s was dished out by wealthy Muslim leaders who had no touch with reality and no connection with common Muslims. Despite the community's division into Shia, Sunnis, authentic (those claiming lineage from Turkish, Persian, Afghan, and Moguls), converts (including oppressed untouchable Hindus) and village Muslims who still practised Hindu rituals, a large section of Muslims rallied behind the Muslim League and its promise for a homeland where they would be free from "oppression" by the Hindu majority.

The Hindutva putsch is similarly being made by the business class in India. Hindus might be divided into various castes, sub-castes and sects, they might speak 15 different languages and 400 dialects, they may eat different food, look and dress differently — but it won't take long to unify them against their "common enemy". Fundamentalism in Pakistan and support of Kashmiri militants by the Pakistani military has already presented a unifying theme to Hindu fundamentalists who had never accepted a secular India.

The shrill cry of "Hinduism in danger," though successful in the short term will eventually fail in its mission to unite Hindus. Hindu fundamentalism is bound to eventually collapse due to its inherent contradictions. Just like Jinnah's short-sighted approach, Hindu fundamentalists are blind to the effect of their divisive stand. They fail to take into account India's 150 million Muslims. To turn this large population into subservient slaves would not only destroy the moral fabric of the nation, it will create a backlash that will result in blood flowing in each Indian city. Even an infinitesimally small fraction of the Muslim population turning violent will destroy India's stability. Neither the Hindu fundamentalists nor the Indian army can fight a civil war when the "minority" consists of 150 million people.

Unfortunately, before the Hindutva bandwagon comes to rest, the damage done to the subcontinent would be enormous. The time has come for Indians to reject the politics of extremism or be ready to pay a very heavy price.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Opinion

Stories in this Section

Upholding the rule of law

The death of dolly

Crisis for the Arabs

A diseased politics

India and Afghan railroads