Recently, I was having discussion on "rising intolerance" and "economic agenda of Modi" with a friend on Facebook. After lot of push and pulls, my friend said "Beef ban could be justified on the ground that in democracy, majority wins the game of numbers so minority ought to be listen to them". Well, soon the election results were out. Seems like people of Bihar, did not like this notion of democratic majority. Modi received one of the "biggest electoral setbacks of his life". Bihar's mandate could not be construed as entirely "anti-modi" rather it should be seen in terms of combined wave created from caste-class politics, grass-root connections, "Bihari vs. bahari" debate and slowly evaporating warmth for Modi's grand promises during the national election and his speeches from high podium of Red-forts. However, My friend's line of thought left me pondering over question of pluralism and secularism in India.
Over 3500 years of continuous civilizational history, India survived the onslaught of Aryans (debatable, saffron leaders believe that horses were original inhabitant of India), Grecko-bactrian, Parthians, kushanas, Turks, Mughals and later European powers. While west struggled against nature, India struggled against invasion from the outsiders. The major reason behind this survival was our civilizational values of tolerance, accommodation, kindness and humanity. The impact of Indian culture was so deep that most of the kings were Indianized in the process. This could be reflected in historical antecedents where Kushana king named his son "Vasudeva" (an Indian name). Selucus married his daughter to Maurya Dynasty. Akbar had nine ratna in his court house, many of them were non-muslims. The geography, culture and way of life was so rich that invaders could find the right balance between their way of life and locals way of life together contributing to general theme of Indian way of life. This Indian way of life was characterized by values of "respect to other's way of life", "values of collectivism", "mutual interdependence", "tolerance to different opinions, customs, costumes, crafts, carnivals, cuisines, cloths etc", "kindness", "peace" and "humanity". This laid the foundation of India's plauralism and Secularism.
Amartya Sen writes in Argumentative Indian, "This is a unique country where among any cross section of 100 people you could find people of 8 different religions namely Hinduism, Budhdhism, Jainism, Sikhism, Muslims, Christians, Zorastrians, and Jews". Herder, a political scholar of Europe argues that a nation with multiple languages is eventually going to break. His thoughts have proved clairvoyant for modern era Europe but India stands a notable exception of his thoughts. Here not just the language but food, festivals, dresses, and many other aspect of life changes every 50 kilometers. We have more than 24 major constitutionally recognized languages and nearly 260 dialects for a country of perimeter of nearly 15K kilometers. Even Rama a major god in Gujarat is a minor god in Bengal. It is difficult to find any similarity between mannerism of a kerala muslims and UP muslims except the skull cap. This diversity of lifestyle and thoughts underlies our civilizational strength of pluralism.
Had India followed the notion of democratic majority's subordination of minority then we would have been a homogeneous country with one language, one way of dress, one religion, one festival, one kind of food habits. And that would have marked the death of idea of India in the past. Some rulers tried to achieve this homogeneity but our spirit to live ( Eros ) was greater than spirit of dying ( Thanatos ). The plans of Bkhtiyar Khilji and Aurangzeb could never succeed. Leaders like Shivaji, Jat and Sikh rebellion kept Aurangzeb on his tenterhooks. And soon after his death, Mughals degenerated to become history.
India has never followed the tradition of democratic majority except for political usage of term. In India, Democratic majority is merely a mechanism for electing a government and a leader. But the government and the leader is bound to obey our civilizational treasure. The seat of power does not give absolute authority. Our age-old time tested value-system and rich cultural diversity draws some red-lines for any governing authority which should not be crossed. Hardliners may argue that "concept of civilizational values" is lame and ambiguous. They may look for some concrete doctrines which would help in governing in rule-bound manner.
Indian freedom fighters and constitutional forefathers were knowledgeable people who had understood Indian history vis-à-vis western model of majority rule. They used this civilizational strength to break the talisman of western hegemony over Indian culture. As a result, Indian constitution encapsulates these values in very articulate manner. It provides the necessary skeleton, the basic framework within which government of the day should rule. Those who wish to remain oblivion to Indian history, can learn about the idea of pluralism and secularism from the constitution. It may not be a treatise of history but it succinctly elaborate various rules of behavior for proper administration.
First, let us see the idea of secularism. Indian secularism is not same as Western secularism. Western Secularism derived concept of Secularism from Machiavelli's thought in "The Prince". Machiavelli argued that "religion should be completely separated from politics". Consequently, Religion should be limited to private sphere of life. This forms the basis of French policy of "Lucite" where Sikhs are banned from wearing turban or Muslims are banned from wearing hijab or the majority population of Christian is banned from flaunting cross in public. Indian secularism believes that state should maintain a principled distance with all religions. In fact, Indian constitution distinctly award certain rights to their citizen under article 25 to 28 and separately protect minority interest against majority domination under article 29 and 20. Under this, an individual has fundamental right to profess, propagate, and practice their religion.
In Indian landscape, religion has been very closely integrated with people's way of life. A number of our choices of food, cloth, and customs are derived from our religious belief. In this context, religion becomes a powerful source of identity for individual. Individual personal mental growth is closely linked with his freedom of religious expression. Ours is a country where ISRO's chief visits Tirupati temple before a major launch or leader of masses are seen wearing rings or trinkets. Thus Constitutional protection of these freedom of expressions becomes quint-essential for our well being and societal well being. No government of the day ought to cross this red lines in visible or invisible manner.
These written rules of secularism has become a guiding light to continue the tradition of pluralism in most integrational manner. Our pluralism refers to our diversity of custom, costume, cuisine, craft, carnivals, communication (Language) and most importantly opinion, thought and beliefs. This has become possible due to our past history of accommodation, respect to other's way of life, tolerance, peace and mutual interdependence. In the present context, concept of secularism as enshrined in our constitutional document provides us the vision and wisdom to maintain this plurality. It rejects the idea of homogeneity. It rejects the idea of domination of majority over minority's way of life. It also rejects the idea of one nation, one language, one religion.
This plurality and path finding light of secularism limits the notion of democratic majority to its political context. Probably, this is the reason India became the largest and one of the most vibrant democracy in the world. Almost all the countries which were emancipated from colonial rule during mid 20th century have succumbed to forces of dictatorship, oligarchy or coup. India stands as a notable exception. This could be attributed to combined DNA of plurality, secularism and democracy in veins of Indian masses. Ours is a country where a chai-walah became prime minister. At one point, we had President with religion affiliation with Islam, Prime minister with religious affiliations with Sikhism and Leader of largest coalition with Christian background. Such diversity could not be find elsewhere in the world.
So let us cherish this diversity and not be drained with the propaganda of beef ban, love-jihad, ghar wapasi or narrow other religious agenda. When the calamity comes, homogeneity is destroyed, Only diversity survives. Let us work together to make India more freer, diverse and consequently much more stronger.
Will look into grammar later..
Over 3500 years of continuous civilizational history, India survived the onslaught of Aryans (debatable, saffron leaders believe that horses were original inhabitant of India), Grecko-bactrian, Parthians, kushanas, Turks, Mughals and later European powers. While west struggled against nature, India struggled against invasion from the outsiders. The major reason behind this survival was our civilizational values of tolerance, accommodation, kindness and humanity. The impact of Indian culture was so deep that most of the kings were Indianized in the process. This could be reflected in historical antecedents where Kushana king named his son "Vasudeva" (an Indian name). Selucus married his daughter to Maurya Dynasty. Akbar had nine ratna in his court house, many of them were non-muslims. The geography, culture and way of life was so rich that invaders could find the right balance between their way of life and locals way of life together contributing to general theme of Indian way of life. This Indian way of life was characterized by values of "respect to other's way of life", "values of collectivism", "mutual interdependence", "tolerance to different opinions, customs, costumes, crafts, carnivals, cuisines, cloths etc", "kindness", "peace" and "humanity". This laid the foundation of India's plauralism and Secularism.
Amartya Sen writes in Argumentative Indian, "This is a unique country where among any cross section of 100 people you could find people of 8 different religions namely Hinduism, Budhdhism, Jainism, Sikhism, Muslims, Christians, Zorastrians, and Jews". Herder, a political scholar of Europe argues that a nation with multiple languages is eventually going to break. His thoughts have proved clairvoyant for modern era Europe but India stands a notable exception of his thoughts. Here not just the language but food, festivals, dresses, and many other aspect of life changes every 50 kilometers. We have more than 24 major constitutionally recognized languages and nearly 260 dialects for a country of perimeter of nearly 15K kilometers. Even Rama a major god in Gujarat is a minor god in Bengal. It is difficult to find any similarity between mannerism of a kerala muslims and UP muslims except the skull cap. This diversity of lifestyle and thoughts underlies our civilizational strength of pluralism.
Had India followed the notion of democratic majority's subordination of minority then we would have been a homogeneous country with one language, one way of dress, one religion, one festival, one kind of food habits. And that would have marked the death of idea of India in the past. Some rulers tried to achieve this homogeneity but our spirit to live ( Eros ) was greater than spirit of dying ( Thanatos ). The plans of Bkhtiyar Khilji and Aurangzeb could never succeed. Leaders like Shivaji, Jat and Sikh rebellion kept Aurangzeb on his tenterhooks. And soon after his death, Mughals degenerated to become history.
India has never followed the tradition of democratic majority except for political usage of term. In India, Democratic majority is merely a mechanism for electing a government and a leader. But the government and the leader is bound to obey our civilizational treasure. The seat of power does not give absolute authority. Our age-old time tested value-system and rich cultural diversity draws some red-lines for any governing authority which should not be crossed. Hardliners may argue that "concept of civilizational values" is lame and ambiguous. They may look for some concrete doctrines which would help in governing in rule-bound manner.
Indian freedom fighters and constitutional forefathers were knowledgeable people who had understood Indian history vis-à-vis western model of majority rule. They used this civilizational strength to break the talisman of western hegemony over Indian culture. As a result, Indian constitution encapsulates these values in very articulate manner. It provides the necessary skeleton, the basic framework within which government of the day should rule. Those who wish to remain oblivion to Indian history, can learn about the idea of pluralism and secularism from the constitution. It may not be a treatise of history but it succinctly elaborate various rules of behavior for proper administration.
First, let us see the idea of secularism. Indian secularism is not same as Western secularism. Western Secularism derived concept of Secularism from Machiavelli's thought in "The Prince". Machiavelli argued that "religion should be completely separated from politics". Consequently, Religion should be limited to private sphere of life. This forms the basis of French policy of "Lucite" where Sikhs are banned from wearing turban or Muslims are banned from wearing hijab or the majority population of Christian is banned from flaunting cross in public. Indian secularism believes that state should maintain a principled distance with all religions. In fact, Indian constitution distinctly award certain rights to their citizen under article 25 to 28 and separately protect minority interest against majority domination under article 29 and 20. Under this, an individual has fundamental right to profess, propagate, and practice their religion.
In Indian landscape, religion has been very closely integrated with people's way of life. A number of our choices of food, cloth, and customs are derived from our religious belief. In this context, religion becomes a powerful source of identity for individual. Individual personal mental growth is closely linked with his freedom of religious expression. Ours is a country where ISRO's chief visits Tirupati temple before a major launch or leader of masses are seen wearing rings or trinkets. Thus Constitutional protection of these freedom of expressions becomes quint-essential for our well being and societal well being. No government of the day ought to cross this red lines in visible or invisible manner.
These written rules of secularism has become a guiding light to continue the tradition of pluralism in most integrational manner. Our pluralism refers to our diversity of custom, costume, cuisine, craft, carnivals, communication (Language) and most importantly opinion, thought and beliefs. This has become possible due to our past history of accommodation, respect to other's way of life, tolerance, peace and mutual interdependence. In the present context, concept of secularism as enshrined in our constitutional document provides us the vision and wisdom to maintain this plurality. It rejects the idea of homogeneity. It rejects the idea of domination of majority over minority's way of life. It also rejects the idea of one nation, one language, one religion.
This plurality and path finding light of secularism limits the notion of democratic majority to its political context. Probably, this is the reason India became the largest and one of the most vibrant democracy in the world. Almost all the countries which were emancipated from colonial rule during mid 20th century have succumbed to forces of dictatorship, oligarchy or coup. India stands as a notable exception. This could be attributed to combined DNA of plurality, secularism and democracy in veins of Indian masses. Ours is a country where a chai-walah became prime minister. At one point, we had President with religion affiliation with Islam, Prime minister with religious affiliations with Sikhism and Leader of largest coalition with Christian background. Such diversity could not be find elsewhere in the world.
So let us cherish this diversity and not be drained with the propaganda of beef ban, love-jihad, ghar wapasi or narrow other religious agenda. When the calamity comes, homogeneity is destroyed, Only diversity survives. Let us work together to make India more freer, diverse and consequently much more stronger.
Will look into grammar later..
Very erudite perspective on a pertinent issue... Keep up the enlightening work!
ReplyDeleteVery erudite perspective on a pertinent issue... Keep up the enlightening work!
ReplyDeleteThanks Kiran Ji.. I really appreciate your feedback. I see u r one of the constant follower of my blog. Please provide me with some grammar related feedback as wel
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