Not so secular India

[Muhammad Abid Ayub]

India is only one country in the world where a religious party BJP came into power by the public votes and still it claims to be a secular country...

 

[lem34]

The Rama temple movement was secular: Advani
http://www.firstpost.com/politics/th...ni-129451.html

Nov 13, 2011

Editor’s Note: Sir Mark Tully has been one of the most acclaimed foreign journalists reporting from and about India for audiences around the world. His books include No Full Stops in India and India in Slow Motion. His latest book reports on many of the most hot-button issues confronting India today from jugaad culture to caste politics to tiger poaching. As speculation abounds about L K Advani’s prime ministerial ambitions here is Tully’s encounter with Advani when he was facing his greatest leadership crisis. This is excerpted with the permission of Penguin Books India from the book Non-Stop India by Mark Tully.

When I met Ram Madhav in 2009 the BJP had recently lost its second consecutive general election and was embroiled in a leadership crisis and a dispute over the way ahead. The ideological crisis was caused by the feeling amongst one section of the party that Hindutva had lost its sheen; that the party should now widen its appeal by promoting itself as a right-wing, but not particularly Hindu, alternative to the Congress.

Reuters

Lal Krishan Advani, the politician whose journey across India had raised the temperature of the Rama Temple movement to boiling point, had been the BJP’s candidate to be Prime Minister in the election they had just lost. He was now at the centre of the leadership crisis.

Advani is a sprightly octogenarian whose energetic campaigning in the last election would have exhausted men twenty years younger. I once asked him what was the secret of his good health and energy and he replied, ‘I think it’s perhaps because I don’t eat very much.’ When I asked whether he did yoga or other exercises he replied, ‘No, nothing like that.’

For the last forty years he and the BJP’s former Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, had formed a partnership at the top of the BJP. Vajpayee was the soft face of the party. He cultivated an image that would appeal to a much wider section of the electorate than those who were attracted by Hindutva. Advani played the role of the hardliner who kept the Hindutva vote intact.

Perhaps surprisingly he has never been a particularly observant Hindu.

He was brought up in what is now the Pakistani province of Sindh and there most Hindus, including his parents, were followers of Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh religion. Many Hindus in Sindh were so broad-minded that they respected Sufi sm and paid homage to Sufi saints at their shrines.

Advani himself was educated at a Christian school and in his autobiography he wrote: ‘My school’s reputation, the loving and nurturing by its teachers, its architectural beauty, and its quiet environs—all these made me proud to belong to St Patrick’s.’

When I went to see Advani in his official bungalow in Delhi he had still not made up his mind whether to step down from the leadership of the parliamentary party. I asked him first about the election—whether he felt it showed that the party’s Hindutva agenda was too narrow, that it didn’t appeal to a wide enough section of the electorate.

‘It might be better for us to talk of Bharatiyata, which is a word more like Indian-ness,’ he said. ‘But the point is that Hindutva is not the name of a religion. It is more a way of life in India which can be regarded as Indian culture. Do you know that the Archbishop of Hyderabad told me he could support our cultural nationalism?’

‘But wouldn’t you agree that your party’s support for Hindutva has created an allergy towards Hinduism?’

‘I regard this allergy towards Hinduism as stemming from the concern for vote bank politics. That is pandering to the minorities, particularly the Muslims to create a vote bank, telling them they are in danger from the Hindu majority. This has created what I have called pseudo-secularism, which has nothing to do with traditional Indian secularism. You know that Hinduism is so varied that you can’t actually appeal to Hindus in the name of religion, no matter what they say about my politics. But vote bank politicians do appeal to minorities like Muslims and Christians in the name of their religions because their religions are not varied.’

When I suggested to Advani that his Rama yatra and the whole Rama Temple movement was an attempt to build up a Hindu vote bank, using religion to appeal to Hindus, he made the rather strange claim that the support he received showed the Temple movement was secular, saying:

‘The response to the yatra made an impact on many intellectuals who began to understand the deep feelings of Indians and realise that the RamaTemple movement was secular. I said to myself for the first time I have been able to communicate that when we talk of Hindutva, or project the party’s viewpoint, we are not being communal. Those who criticise us for being communal are pseudo-secular. The proof is many intellectuals were converted to Hindutva by the yatra.’

I pointed out that leaders of the World Hindu Council and other organisations affiliated to the RSS and identified with the BJP certainly did insult Muslims and Christians in their speeches. Advani couldn’t deny that, but he went on to say, ‘It’s not the RSS point of view nor the BJP’s. I have told those leaders, “You talk a language which may only justify Islamic fundamentalism. Please don’t.”’

Eventually I came back to the word ‘Bharatiyata’ which Advani had suggested might replace Hindutva in the BJP’s vocabulary, and suggested this meant he felt the party should have an agenda with a wider appeal than Hindutva.

He shot back angrily, which was rare for him, ‘What agenda? Let me tell you that in China do they say that we have put aside the Marxist agenda? They can do what they want and still say they are Marxists although they are not. Nobody says they have a new agenda or they have given up their old agenda. One keeps on evolving. It is evolution. All I’ve said to you is evolution. It will continue to be. There has to be diversity and change in India.’

‘So now is there to be further evolution?’

‘Yes, always.’

One of those whose views of secularism were changed by Advani’s yatra was Swapan Dasgupta, a journalist with a doctorate in History from London University. In recent years he had come very close to the BJP leadership but he held no official position. Advani had told me that Swapan had been ‘converted’ by the Rama yatra. When I put that to Swapan he smiled and said, ‘I wouldn’t exactly say converted. But when I saw the yatra in Udaipur, the phenomenal mobilisation of people, the emotional raw energy, it did overcome me. You have to realise that even before Advani took up the Rama issue there was a critique of secularism in some people’s minds. There was a feeling that there were double standards, and that Hindus were not being given a stake in the country.

On the other hand there was the enormous degree of condescension of the left liberal historians with their claim to modernity. They dismissed those who recognised that one of the pillars of India is its Hindu inheritance as country bumpkins. Then there was the political hypocrisy of the Congress Party. You must remember the Shah Bano case, a preposterous denial of human rights to acquire a vote bank.’

Shah Bano was a Muslim woman who had been divorced and appealed to the courts for maintenance. Her former husband contended that under Islamic law paying her maintenance for three months was sufficient. The courts upheld Shah Bano’s right to maintenance but the government, headed by Rajiv Gandhi, overturned that verdict by passing a bill under which responsibility for maintaining Shah Bano fell on her relatives not on her former husband.

When I asked Swapan why the debate over secularism had gone off the boil he put it down to a new-found self-confidence amongst Hindus: ‘In the late eighties Hindus saw themselves as victims, they felt besieged and they also saw their country being left behind globally. Socialism had clearly come to a dead end, and India seemed to be going nowhere. Now Hindus no longer feel beleaguered and there is a cocksure, irrational exuberance about the economic progress we are now making, a feeling we have shown our potential, an excitement at our global exposure.’

‘But why have the secularists apparently quietened down too? Why has there been no reaction to the propagation of Hinduism on television?’

‘I think that within the Congress Party there has been a greater realisation that secular fundamentalism is an absurd project. If you are oversecular you invite a reaction. If you insist on denying the role of Hinduism in Indian culture you propel Hindus in the opposite direction.’

And just as we are seeing a redefining of the word Hinduvta to Bharatiyata we will soon see an Indian definition of secularism however it will mean the opposite of what is stated in the Oxford dictionary.

 

[Loyus]

India is only one country in the world where a religious party BJP came into power by the public votes and still it claims to be a secular country...

BJP did not come to power on the basis of Hindu votes.. It came to power on the basis of one of India's most charismatoic leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee..
You have to understand the Hindu psyche !!!
Hindu do not constitute one nation.. It is extremely fragmented....

And you know Hinduism is extremely diverse as a concept..
And concentually you know who can be the enemy of a Hindu ?
a Hindu himself..
(e.g. clash between Shaivism and Vaishnavism)

 

[Roybot]

India is only one country in the world where a religious party BJP came into power by the public votes and still it claims to be a secular country...

What about Turkey?

And BJP is not a religious party.

 

[lem34]

The Rama temple movement was secular: Advani
The Rama temple movement was secular: Advani | Firstpost

Nov 13, 2011

Editor’s Note: Sir Mark Tully has been one of the most acclaimed foreign journalists reporting from and about India for audiences around the world. His books include No Full Stops in India and India in Slow Motion. His latest book reports on many of the most hot-button issues confronting India today from jugaad culture to caste politics to tiger poaching. As speculation abounds about L K Advani’s prime ministerial ambitions here is Tully’s encounter with Advani when he was facing his greatest leadership crisis. This is excerpted with the permission of Penguin Books India from the book Non-Stop India by Mark Tully.

When I met Ram Madhav in 2009 the BJP had recently lost its second consecutive general election and was embroiled in a leadership crisis and a dispute over the way ahead. The ideological crisis was caused by the feeling amongst one section of the party that Hindutva had lost its sheen; that the party should now widen its appeal by promoting itself as a right-wing, but not particularly Hindu, alternative to the Congress.

Reuters

Lal Krishan Advani, the politician whose journey across India had raised the temperature of the Rama Temple movement to boiling point, had been the BJP’s candidate to be Prime Minister in the election they had just lost. He was now at the centre of the leadership crisis.

Advani is a sprightly octogenarian whose energetic campaigning in the last election would have exhausted men twenty years younger. I once asked him what was the secret of his good health and energy and he replied, ‘I think it’s perhaps because I don’t eat very much.’ When I asked whether he did yoga or other exercises he replied, ‘No, nothing like that.’

For the last forty years he and the BJP’s former Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, had formed a partnership at the top of the BJP. Vajpayee was the soft face of the party. He cultivated an image that would appeal to a much wider section of the electorate than those who were attracted by Hindutva. Advani played the role of the hardliner who kept the Hindutva vote intact.

Perhaps surprisingly he has never been a particularly observant Hindu.

He was brought up in what is now the Pakistani province of Sindh and there most Hindus, including his parents, were followers of Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh religion. Many Hindus in Sindh were so broad-minded that they respected Sufi sm and paid homage to Sufi saints at their shrines.

Advani himself was educated at a Christian school and in his autobiography he wrote: ‘My school’s reputation, the loving and nurturing by its teachers, its architectural beauty, and its quiet environs—all these made me proud to belong to St Patrick’s.’

When I went to see Advani in his official bungalow in Delhi he had still not made up his mind whether to step down from the leadership of the parliamentary party. I asked him first about the election—whether he felt it showed that the party’s Hindutva agenda was too narrow, that it didn’t appeal to a wide enough section of the electorate.

‘It might be better for us to talk of Bharatiyata, which is a word more like Indian-ness,’ he said. ‘But the point is that Hindutva is not the name of a religion. It is more a way of life in India which can be regarded as Indian culture. Do you know that the Archbishop of Hyderabad told me he could support our cultural nationalism?’

‘But wouldn’t you agree that your party’s support for Hindutva has created an allergy towards Hinduism?’

‘I regard this allergy towards Hinduism as stemming from the concern for vote bank politics. That is pandering to the minorities, particularly the Muslims to create a vote bank, telling them they are in danger from the Hindu majority. This has created what I have called pseudo-secularism, which has nothing to do with traditional Indian secularism. You know that Hinduism is so varied that you can’t actually appeal to Hindus in the name of religion, no matter what they say about my politics. But vote bank politicians do appeal to minorities like Muslims and Christians in the name of their religions because their religions are not varied.’

When I suggested to Advani that his Rama yatra and the whole Rama Temple movement was an attempt to build up a Hindu vote bank, using religion to appeal to Hindus, he made the rather strange claim that the support he received showed the Temple movement was secular, saying:

‘The response to the yatra made an impact on many intellectuals who began to understand the deep feelings of Indians and realise that the RamaTemple movement was secular. I said to myself for the first time I have been able to communicate that when we talk of Hindutva, or project the party’s viewpoint, we are not being communal. Those who criticise us for being communal are pseudo-secular. The proof is many intellectuals were converted to Hindutva by the yatra.’

I pointed out that leaders of the World Hindu Council and other organisations affiliated to the RSS and identified with the BJP certainly did insult Muslims and Christians in their speeches. Advani couldn’t deny that, but he went on to say, ‘It’s not the RSS point of view nor the BJP’s. I have told those leaders, “You talk a language which may only justify Islamic fundamentalism. Please don’t.”’

Eventually I came back to the word ‘Bharatiyata’ which Advani had suggested might replace Hindutva in the BJP’s vocabulary, and suggested this meant he felt the party should have an agenda with a wider appeal than Hindutva.

He shot back angrily, which was rare for him, ‘What agenda? Let me tell you that in China do they say that we have put aside the Marxist agenda? They can do what they want and still say they are Marxists although they are not. Nobody says they have a new agenda or they have given up their old agenda. One keeps on evolving. It is evolution. All I’ve said to you is evolution. It will continue to be. There has to be diversity and change in India.’

‘So now is there to be further evolution?’

‘Yes, always.’

One of those whose views of secularism were changed by Advani’s yatra was Swapan Dasgupta, a journalist with a doctorate in History from London University. In recent years he had come very close to the BJP leadership but he held no official position. Advani had told me that Swapan had been ‘converted’ by the Rama yatra. When I put that to Swapan he smiled and said, ‘I wouldn’t exactly say converted. But when I saw the yatra in Udaipur, the phenomenal mobilisation of people, the emotional raw energy, it did overcome me. You have to realise that even before Advani took up the Rama issue there was a critique of secularism in some people’s minds. There was a feeling that there were double standards, and that Hindus were not being given a stake in the country.

On the other hand there was the enormous degree of condescension of the left liberal historians with their claim to modernity. They dismissed those who recognised that one of the pillars of India is its Hindu inheritance as country bumpkins. Then there was the political hypocrisy of the Congress Party. You must remember the Shah Bano case, a preposterous denial of human rights to acquire a vote bank.’

Shah Bano was a Muslim woman who had been divorced and appealed to the courts for maintenance. Her former husband contended that under Islamic law paying her maintenance for three months was sufficient. The courts upheld Shah Bano’s right to maintenance but the government, headed by Rajiv Gandhi, overturned that verdict by passing a bill under which responsibility for maintaining Shah Bano fell on her relatives not on her former husband.

When I asked Swapan why the debate over secularism had gone off the boil he put it down to a new-found self-confidence amongst Hindus: ‘In the late eighties Hindus saw themselves as victims, they felt besieged and they also saw their country being left behind globally. Socialism had clearly come to a dead end, and India seemed to be going nowhere. Now Hindus no longer feel beleaguered and there is a cocksure, irrational exuberance about the economic progress we are now making, a feeling we have shown our potential, an excitement at our global exposure.’

‘But why have the secularists apparently quietened down too? Why has there been no reaction to the propagation of Hinduism on television?’

‘I think that within the Congress Party there has been a greater realisation that secular fundamentalism is an absurd project. If you are oversecular you invite a reaction. If you insist on denying the role of Hinduism in Indian culture you propel Hindus in the opposite direction.’

And just as we are seeing a redefining of the word Hinduvta to Bharatiyata we will soon see an Indian definition of secularism however it will mean the opposite of what is stated in the Oxford dictionary.

come on guys can i have some comments on the article above please

 

[Developereo]

I can't be bothered to answer such tripe. Let the readers decide what they would.

For me, more than the mental gymnastics shown here, what was really amusing was the need felt for that gymnastics.

That one actually has to "justify" the superior Indian treatment of its minority population as deferring to "Arab oil", conjecture wild scenarios of what will happen when the Arab oil runs out, even put wild conjectures on individual private Indian companies' policies and so on.

It was funny in the extreme.

We understand the need though. It has been made clear often enough in this thread.

Every bloody day. Oh, the bloody curse!

The incoherent bloviations that constitute the typical Hindutva response to the topic don't merit any response. I already wrote I couldn't be bothered responding to such babblings, but ...

The abject ignorance of international work permits, business relationship management, not to mention Indian history and current events is quite a spectacle to witness. All evidence of Hindutva bigotry is just the fabrication of secularists, communalists, Marxists and all manner of evil groups, including the Indian government itself, just to defame the poor Hindutva.

Once again, since the subject itself is indefensible, I am certain we will be regaled with another off-topic babbling about Pakistan or Muslim invasions or some such.

 

[notsuperstitious]

I can't be bothered to answer such tripe. Let the readers decide what they would.

For me, more than the mental gymnastics shown here, what was really amusing was the need felt for that gymnastics.

That one actually has to "justify" the superior Indian treatment of its minority population as deferring to "Arab oil", conjecture wild scenarios of what will happen when the Arab oil runs out, even put wild conjectures on individual private Indian companies' policies and so on.

It was funny in the extreme.

We understand the need though. It has been made clear often enough in this thread.

Every bloody day. Oh, the bloody curse!

Very well said. The weird psycho babble and even weirder theories about how a billion indians conspire to portray an artificial image is awesome. They speak as if they attended one of our midnight secret meetings, but they did not as i took roll call and only one billion showed up, nobody from the neighborhood

Seriously, are we bothered with pakistan being a perfect islamic state? Pakistanis should be. And yes, they do claim islam to be the better systems, so all they have to worry about is their own system perfection and automatically thats better than our secularism, perfect or inperfect. But their keen interest in india's secularism, mental gymnastics, deep denial, ingrained hatred, weird theories and basically offering apologies for murders, from ilm ud din to dawood to kasab to qadri, only goes to show how condemned they are. Indeed the curse you speak of is evident.

 

[Developereo]

Uh oh. Looks like the Indian troll brigade is shifting here after getting their as$ kicked in the Tibet thread....

The mutual self-consolatory babble-fest should be fun to watch...

 

[fd24]

Uh oh. Looks like the Indian troll brigade is shifting here from the Tibet thread....

The babble-fest should be fun to watch...

minus ks - very terrible that he is wearing pink sari.

 

[Ambitious449]

India is only one country in the world where a religious party BJP came into power by the public votes and still it claims to be a secular country...

I think you would like to recheck your info. BJP never won single-handedly any national level election. BJP formed government with 13 other parties in collation which consists many secular parties.

 

[Ahmad]

India is only one country in the world where a religious party BJP came into power by the public votes and still it claims to be a secular country...

Sorry for jumping between you guys, but AKP is a party based on islamic values, they won the last elections, but Turkey is still a secular country and AKP is committed to secularism. I think it will be the same for india(if i am not mistaken).

 

[Developereo]

And BJP is not a religious party.

BJP exploits religious bigotry by telling majority Hindus ("us") that Congress panders to Muslims and Christians ("them").

 

[notsuperstitious]

Sorry for jumping between you guys, but AKP is a party based on islamic values, they won the last elections, but Turkey is still a secular country and AKP is committed to secularism. I think it will be the same for india(if i am not mistaken).

Also, BJP won only when they formed an alliance and for that they had to drop their controvercial agendas. the agends of NDA is there for everyone to see. The same BJP proposed Kalam as India's president, their India of Hindutva is controvercial but theyr stuck to it by making Kalam India's president, a nationalistic muslim steeped in indian culture.

BJP exploits religious bigotry by telling majority Hindus ("us") that Congress panders to Muslims and Christians ("them").

Congress changed indian constitution to pander to bigoted muslim sentiment in the shah bano case, denying justice to a poor woman. Calling that pandering what it is and saving secularism is not bigotry, also that does not make BJP a hindu party.

 

[Ambitious449]

I am not fan of BJP but BJP have become matured since 1996. Democracy and collation government mellowed them. In centre there is very little difference between congress policies and BJP policies. It 's like Republicans and Democrats in USA.

 

[Loyus]

BJP exploits religious bigotry by telling majority Hindus ("us") that Congress panders to Muslims and Christians ("them").

that's half-truth

Congress infact plays votebank politics too....
Same with other poltical parties.like RJD, Samajwadi party etc etc

If you consider a scenario then consider the whole aspect

Don;t be selctive

Indian public has rejected religious issues .. What matters is not religion but food, job, development