The Secular Road to Hell

Ramananda Sengupta

Secularism.

I have always wondered how such a seemingly innocuous word has turned into such a politically loaded noun in India.

By definition, the word essentially means separating religion from matters of state.

‘WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens,’ goes the first line of the Preamble to our Constitution.

But hold on a second.

The original framers of our constitution did not put the word Secular there.

It was added by the Indira Gandhi government during the Emergency, through the Constitution (42nd Amendment) Act, 1976, along with 58 other changes. The word ‘Socialist’ too was added, while ‘Unity of the nation’ was changed to ‘unity and integrity of the nation.’

Perhaps, just perhaps, it was well intentioned. But the road to Hell, they say, is paved with good intentions.

Also read: 'Secular' Muslims want Taslima back in Kolkata | Temple demolitions: Why is our govt mum?

After having inserted the word, however, the ‘secular’ Congress Party blocked all subsequent attempts to officially define it. And that has been the bane of our polity - and our nation - since then.

Because without a clear definition, secularism means nothing. Or rather, it means different things to different people.

For politicians, it means liberty to play vote bank games based on religion. In the same way that VP Singh, the 10th Prime Minister of India, brutally and callously divided the nation along caste lines for political mileage in 1990.

For religious leaders, it means liberty to exploit politicians for their own petty gains, in return for assuring them the vote of ‘their people.’

For the common man, it means confusion, chaos and often violence spawned by the viciously divisive ‘Us and Them’ philosophy promoted by our religious and political leaders.

Attempts were even made recently – on the basis of something called the High Level Committee for Preparation of Report on Social, Economic and Educational Status of the Muslim Community of India, better known as Rajinder Sachar Commission Report -- to introduce this division among the most secular institutions in the country, the Indian Army. Thankfully, the Army would have none of it.

But we haven’t heard the last of that yet; because reservation for minorities is seen as a sure way to get their vote.

This divide and rule policy that our politicians practice ensures that We the People of India, as the framers of our constitution so grandly described us, cannot agree even on things that are obviously good for us all. Like secularism as the dictionary defines it.

Instead, even as we proudly tout our so-called secular credentials, successive governments have clearly used religion for political gain.

But how can we be a secular state when we have separate laws based on religion?

How can we be a secular state when the government selectively funds pilgrimages and religious institutions?

How can we be a secular state when the government allows schools and colleges to have quotas based on religion, and actually tries to extend that to the corporate sector and even to the armed forces?

How can we be a secular state when politicians campaign on purely religious platforms, and win?

And most importantly, how can we be a secular state without clearly defining what it means?

Yes, we are certainly better off than some of our neighbours, like Pakistan and Bangladesh, and perhaps even Nepal, till recently known as the only Hindu kingdom.

Pakistan and Bangladesh (and a host of nations in the Persian Gulf and Africa) proudly declare Islam as their state religion, and make no pretence about being secular.

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Pakistan was born because Indian Muslims -- egged on by the devious departing British -- demanded a separate state for themselves. And despite separating from Pakistan in 1971, Islam is the state religion of Bangladesh too. Which explains why the non-Muslim population in both these nations is rapidly dwindling.

Our politicians, however, in order to prove that we are secular, and of course, in order to garner our votes, have gone to the other extreme, taking steps which can easily -- and in most cases correctly -- be construed as “minority appeasement.”

Things have reached such a pass that whoever uses that last phrase is immediately branded as ‘anti-secular’ and a right wing bigot.

Things have reached such a pass that some years ago, some Muslim men prevented firemen from rescuing a woman from a burning Kolkata tenement, saying it would be against their religion to let an unknown male touch her. The woman burned to death.

Instead of booking the men for murder, as any ‘secular’ state would have, however, the West Bengal government grandly declared that they would induct women fire fighters to assist in such cases.

This peculiar brand of secularism trumped free speech, also enshrined in our Constitution, when it came to Taslima Nasreen, a rather insipid but feisty writer who invoked the wrath of the mighty Maulanas of our Islamic neighbour, Bangladesh.

Her crime? To attest that “If any religion allows the persecution of the people of different faiths, if any religion keeps women in slavery, if any religion keeps people in ignorance, then I can't accept that religion.”

Taslima fled, and finally landed on Secular India’s shores. But not to be outdone, our very own Maulanas too started baying for her head. And we all know what happened since: Goodbye free speech. Hello secularism.

Many many moons ago, I came across an old school friend of mine whose family owns a large, upmarket tailoring shop in Kolkata. He was going to get married, he told me; for the third time.

“My Maulana has told us that being a democracy, we can turn India into a Muslim country purely on the basis of votes. And we will. Perhaps not today. But someday, our children will rule, for sure. Nothing can stop us,” he said matter of factly, before going on to explain how that would be a wonderful thing, where the rule of God and the rule of the land would be synchronised. A land where everyone could live without fear, and so on.

At that time, I had laughed out loud, saying that he obviously had not paid attention during our classes on “civics”, where we had learnt all about “unity in diversity” and the unflinchingly Secular ethos of our nation.

Today, I flinch when the word is mentioned.

Secularism should be made of sterner stuff.

Why am I proud of India?

Ramananda Sengupta

Before my posture stiffens and my heart fills with martial pride, as it does every Republic Day when I watch the parade on Delhi’s Rajpath, I thought I would take a quick stock of what it means for me to be an Indian.

My grandfather, the first Indian civil surgeon of pre-independence Dhaka, fled with his family to what is now Assam in early 1946, a year before a partitioned India gained formal independence.

His crime? He was a Hindu. The British were clearly going to leave India, and the leaders of the freedom struggle were fighting over what form the new country would take. Instigated by Jinnah and company, Muslim-dominated Dhaka was restive.

In July 1946, massive communal riots broke out in Calcutta, sparked by the Muslim League which was demanding a separate state based on religious grounds, and the Congress, which was trying to resist this demand. The unrest spread, and in October came the massacre at Noakhali, now in Bangladesh .

"The horror of the Noakhali outrage is unique in modern history in that it was not a simple case of turbulent members of the majority community (Muslims) killing off helpless members of the minority Hindu community, but was one whose chief aim was mass conversion, accompanied by loot, arson and wholesale devastation... No section of the Hindu community has been spared, the wealthier classes being dealt with more drastically. Abduction and outrage of Hindu women and forcible marriages were also resorted. The slogans used and the methods employed indicate that it was all part of a plan for the simultaneous establishment of Pakistan."

Wikipedia, quoting S. L. Ghosh of the A. B. Patrika. (which is confusing, given that two major Bengali newspapers at the time were Ananda Bazar Patrika and Amrita Bazar Patrika)

These riots were meant to, and did, convince the departing British that Hindus and Muslims could not live together in the country, and that the Muslims needed their own homeland based on religion.

Independence finally came with the religious bloodbath of Partition, whose scars still mark the subcontinent. The Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the other new nation, was broken up again with the birth of Bangladesh in 1971.

By the same author: The Secular Road to Hell

Today, India is in the news as the most powerful player in the subcontinent, and perhaps the second most powerful in terms of economic and military might in Asia.

Today, Pakistan and Bangladesh are in the news for being almost-failed states, yo-yoing between military and civilian rule, and for being the breeding grounds of jihadi terrorists seeking to establish Sharia law across the world.

Both share long borders with India.

Relations with Pakistan have been hostile since independence. Bangladesh, which attained independence with Indian assistance, is now happily reviving linkages with its erstwhile oppressor, Pakistan.

The Pakistan high commission in Dhaka is described as the “largest outpost” of Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence, or ISI, by Indian diplomatic and strategic analysts. Over the past five years, an increasing number of terrorist strikes in India have been linked to Bangladesh, though Dhaka vehemently denies any such involvement.

Radical Islam and turbulent neighbours thus threaten India from the east and the west. (And, if you factor in the ISI’s increasing activity in Nepal and civil-war torn Sri Lanka, from the north and south as well.)

In essence, we are surrounded by tin-pot dictators and their ilk taking perpetual pot shots at us, sometimes with heavy weaponry, sometimes with policies of “a thousand cuts.”

Yet, despite having the third largest -- after Indonesia and Pakistan-- Muslim population in the world, very few Indian Muslims have been linked with the increasing number of terrorist acts being perpetuated in the name of Islam across the globe. Instead of examining the reasons for this, zealots on each side of the religious divide tend to marginalise it.

So it is no surprise that security agencies are nowadays increasingly warning about indigenous jihadi terrorist cells being activated. Poverty and perceived discrimination make it easier for the radical preachers to recruit suicide bombers and other killers in the name of religion, assert our social scientists. This in turn gives teeth to the government’s plans to grant further sops to the Muslim community, ignoring the fact that this can only widen and deepen the communal divide, not bridge it.

In my book, equality cannot be achieved on the basis of sops based on religious or ethnic grounds, simply because it fuels further expectations and dependency among those receiving it, and resentment among those being denied it. But obviously our government knows better.

As a nation, we are still high on the Corruption Index, and despite incredible progress in various spheres, a huge chunk of our population still goes to bed hungry. Naxals and radicals of all hues are increasingly capitalising on this immense disparity, so glaringly portrayed in the numerous pictures of the slums surrounding swank Mumbai high rises.

Yes, we have problems. Of poverty, of inequality. Of governance. Of pesky, unstable and jealous neighbours who fuel religious and ethnic strife in our land.

But we also have plenty to be proud of.

Unlike our neighbours, not once, and this includes the brief spell of Emergency Rule, did we ever have the military take over, or even try to, take over the nation. And at least on paper, We the People get a chance to elect our own leaders every five years or so.

Over the years, I have seen this nation grow in phenomenal leaps and bounds, particularly after the end of the Licence Raj.

I remember when people had to wait five or more years for a phone line. When those wanting an automobile were forced to choose between the Ambassador and the Fiat.

Today, I see vegetable sellers and even street sweepers with mobile handsets. Today, I see an Indian company bidding for, and buying iconic automobile brands like Jaguar and Land Rover.

Today, I see almost every nation in the world making a beeline for a resurgent and proud India, well on its way to take its place at the top table of world powers.

This despite all the seemingly insurmountable internal and external fault lines that permeate and plague the country. This despite all the cynical naysayers –some of them Indian-- who used to periodically write us off as a “basket case.”

Which is why it is important for us remember that our nation is far, far more than just its people, or its leaders.

Which is why each Republic Day, my chest swells with pride as I salute My India.

Jai Hind.