A question of hegemony

Tabish Khair on the dangers of Arab cultural imperialism in South Asia, especially in India.

February 21, 2015 05:04 pm | Updated 05:04 pm IST

Arab cultural imperialism poses a danger in India. Photo: Kiran Bakale

Arab cultural imperialism poses a danger in India. Photo: Kiran Bakale

Women are not allowed to enter some or all Muslim graveyards in my hometown any more. This is new; while women could not participate in funeral processions in the past, they were free to visit graves until very recently. I have heard of camels being sacrificed for Eid in Bihar, a state where camels are not seen and where, until recently, Muslims would consume camel meat with great reluctance. A recent Facebook debate about the legitimacy of celebrating Prophet Mohammad’s birthday was dominated by voices from South Asia asking if the Arabs celebrated the occasion, for, in that case, it would be justified. Also, during festivals in India or Pakistan, you increasingly find some Muslims dressed in Arab garb. Until two decades ago, this was unheard of, except in fancy dress parties in metropolitan circles. I will not say anything about what Muslim women have started encumbering themselves with in recent decades.

The list is long. Behind it lies a number of factors, all of them associated with notions — correct or not — of the authenticity of Arab culture and practices in an ‘Islamic’ context. When I say ‘Arab’, I need to apologise to my Arab acquaintances, all of whom would find it difficult to relate to such manifestations of ‘Arabness.’ Just as many Americas are contained within the rubric ‘USA’ and many Indias under the rubric ‘India,’ there are many versions of Arabness. And still, one can talk of a kind of Arab cultural imperialism; an increasingly muscular and hegemonic version of being ‘Muslim like an Arab’ rooted in the official Wahhabism of Saudi Arabia and exported, with petro-dollars, elsewhere for at least three generations now.

The legitimate leftist critique of western imperialism in India has unfortunately failed to address the even more damaging element of Arab cultural imperialism among Muslims in the sub-continent. Metropolitan leftist scholars in India can never cease talking back to the defunct or totally metamorphosed ‘colonial empire’, a fact partly predicated by their education as well as the greater inroads (positive and negative) of western imperialism on their daily existence. But it is time to address Arab cultural imperialism, because it is far more dangerous today at least in the sub-continent.

There are various reasons why it poses a greater danger to us in India. First, let us be honest about ‘Western imperialism’: much of it is largely due to the dominance of western nations in the world of capitalism, partly due to the colonial past and partly due to various hegemonic factors (including institutions like IMF) today. But, despite this, the common leftist belief that somehow nations, and in particular the U.S., should play Mother Teresa in the world is simply ridiculous. Nations and people and even individuals look after their own interests first. This does not mean that they are selfish; it just means that they protect themselves first, in most cases, before lending a helping hand to someone else. Sometimes this bid to protect their economy or society might be misplaced, even xenophobic, but it is naive or dishonest to blame Western nations for successfully doing what every other nation in the world tries to do or would do.

Moreover, despite the various problems of Western imperialism, Western nations are largely democratic and secular, and pay at least lip-service to democracy internationally. This enables them to create some space for difference internally and internationally, despite what radical leftists or religious fundamentalists (Hindutva or Islamist) might claim. This is not the case with what I have referred to as Arab cultural imperialism: its purest form is the draconian, undemocratic, sexist and discriminatory monarchy of Saudi Arabia, and what it spawns, even as ‘opposition’, is an organisation like ISIS! Moreover, under global capitalism, at least large consumer/producer countries, like China and India, have a degree of leverage with Western imperialism, which can only be frittered away by bad leadership and corruption.

However, there are other reasons why Arab cultural imperialism poses a greater danger in India. For one, it erases and destroys the traces of a rich and distinctive history of Muslim cultures in India: the great Muslim empires of India, such as the Mughals, were not culturally ‘Arab’. Even the narrowly ‘Islamic’ Aurangzeb was far from being a Wahabbi. Subcontinental Muslims have a rich, syncretic and diverse heritage; it should not be destroyed by a narrow form of ‘20th century’ Arab cultural imperialism, rooted in the petro-wealth of a handful of Arab states, and percolating into the subcontinent for three to four generations now in the shape of Gulf jobs as well as madrassa and related funding.

We are not talking of terrorism here, which is another matter altogether and should not be associated solely with either Muslims or Arabs — actually, according to Europol statistics, less than three per cent of all acts of terror in Europe in recent years have been committed by ‘Islamists’. But we are talking of cultural hegemony, and I consider this far more dangerous in the longer run. Moreover, the kind of Arab cultural imperialism that I am alluding to is intellectually and morally hollow to an extent that cannot be indicated in words.

Unfortunately, I doubt that the Hindutva forces currently running India can distinguish between Muslims in India, who are part and parcel of the Indian heritage, and the creeping influence of Arab cultural imperialism. Their more vicious ideologues tend to paint all Muslims with the same brush, unable or unwilling to see the historical variety of Muslim and other cultures, practices and identities in the sub-continent. This, finally, is another reason why Arab cultural imperialism is more dangerous than western imperialism in India. It can become a self-fulfilling prophecy on the part of Hindutva fanatics by erasing the distinctiveness of Indian Muslims.

Tabish Khair is an Indian novelist and academic who teaches in Denmark.

The views expressed in this column are that of the author’s and do not represent those of the newspaper.

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