(This is the latest edition of the Political Line newsletter curated by Varghese K. George. The Political Line newsletter is India’s political landscape explained every week. You can subscribe here to get the newsletter in your inbox every Friday.)
Big Picture
Connecting Tamils and the State of Tamil Nadu to Hindu religious centres in north and western India has become a focus of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s politics. Mr. Modi offers Hindutva’s cultural nationalism that cuts across linguistic identities as a counter to Dravidian politics that dominate the State. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) aims to enfeeble autonomists; Dravidian parties — the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) that is an ally of the Congress and All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), an ally of the BJP — resent this offer of nationalist embrace. They want to assert their linguistic identity.
Recently, 3,000 people from Tamil Nadu, most being descendants of Gujarati speakers who arrived in the State in the 16th and 17th centuries, visited Gujarat under a State sponsored programme — the Saurashtra Tamil Sangamam. Addressing them, Mr. Modi said: “There has been a deep connection between these two States from mythological times. This cultural fusion of Saurashtra and Tamil Nadu, of the west and the south is a flow that has been in motion for thousands of years.” According to Mr. Modi those moving from one part of the country to another never worried about the new language, people, and environment. This showed a cultural unity that cuts across linguistic barriers.
Last year, a Kashi Tamil Sangamam had taken 2,500 Tamils to the ancient city of Varanasi. “Kashi Tamil Sangamam is an attempt to revive the country’s cultural unity. Though India has multiple cultures, languages, and art forms, its soul is one,” Home Minister Amit Shah had said. He called the event a bridge and an attempt to join languages of not just Kashi (or Varanasi) and Tamil Nadu or south and north, but of the entire country.
The third will be the Kedarnath-Tamil Sangamam, which will celebrate the civilisational links between people from the southern part of the country and the Hindu sacred shrines of Uttarakhand in the north.
The Saurashtra event also linked the migration of people from the region to the south to the demolitions of the Somnath temple by Muslim invaders from 11th century onwards. The cause-and-effect correlation here is questionable, but the idea is to acknowledge diversity within the Hindu fold on the one hand, and underscore the antagonism between Hinduism and Islam, on the other.
Dravidian politics inverts this correlation between language and religion. Hindutva counts on religious unity in the face of linguistic diversity; Dravidian ideology promotes linguistic identity as a unifier of religious diversities. “Only language has the power to defeat religious pretensions. When I say religion, I’m not referring to anyone’s religious faith. Religious faith is every individual’s belief, choice, and right. We will not interfere in that. At the same time, we will oppose religion when it is used as a tool to divide Tamils,” Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin said in a different context, last year.
The debate over language and religion as the bond of nationhood is not new. Bengal was divided first over religion and then over language — the Bengali speaking Muslims ended up in an independent country called Bangladesh. In March 1948 Mohammad Ali Jinnah declared that the State language of Pakistan would be Urdu, triggering protests in what was then East Pakistan where people spoke Bangla. The conflict ended in 1971, with the creation of Bangladesh. The shared religion of Islam did not hold Pakistan together.
Shared language also does not guarantee unity. It was Telugu nationalism that set in motion the linguistic reorganisation of States, but a segment of Telugu speakers wanted a separate State, Telangana to be carved out of Andhra Pradesh. Now, the people of Telangana are promoting the idea that their language is different from Andhra Pradesh.
A recent hit film in the State by debut director Venu Yeldandi, Balagam, is themed around family values and bonding, and the unique linguistic identity of the Telangana dialect.
Which is a better unifier: language or religion? History shows that exclusivism of either kind is dangerous. That is the Big Picture.
Federalism tract — Notes on Indian Diversity
Local sentiments
The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) dropped religious symbols from a laser show at Assam’s iconic Rang Ghar during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 100th Mann ki Baat programme following protests by local politicians and activists.
Being Tamil doctors
The mandatory Tamil Eligibility Test, conducted as a part of the Medical Services Recruitment Board examination for 1,021 assistant surgeon posts, has thrown many. While the candidates expected more questions on grammar, translation, and comprehension to test their communication skills, what they faced were several questions on Tamil literature, putting them in a fix.
Hindutva counter to Khalistan separatism
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has decided to work overtime in Punjab and inculcate a sense of “Bharatiyata” and “Hindutva” among the people of the State to combat the growing separatist sentiment.
