Ayodhya verdict - Reminiscences

Nearly 3 decades ago, on December 6, 1992, a long-running dispute between Hindus and Muslims over a religious site in the northern city of Ayodhya took a dramatic turn (Babri Masjid demolished) and changed the course of Indian politics forever. Religious riots erupted, and 900 people, both Muslims and Hindus, were killed in Mumbai. And on March 12, 1993, 13 blasts ripped through the Mumbai city in retaliation for the mosque’s demolition, killing 317. Now, a verdict from the Supreme Court (on Nov 9, 2019) has legally closed the most divisive religious conflict and paved the way for the construction of a Hindu temple at the site. The court has insisted that a mosque also be built, but on an alternative plot of land.  This SC decision will allow the BJP and Modi government to bolster its political fortunes further by construction of a grand Ram temple just ahead of elections in Uttar Pradesh due in March 2022.

• Real closure of the conflict will depend on how, going forward, India treats its more than 175 million Muslim citizens. Anything other than equitable justice will only leave deep scars and gaping wounds.
• Since there has been no violence and protests, we should not mistake this for indifference. But this doesn't entail Muslims accepting the construction of a Ram temple at the site. The court has said that the demolition of the mosque was “a serious violation of the rule of law” and that “it is necessary to provide restitution to the Muslim community for the unlawful destruction of their place of worship.”  Justice in the Babri masjid demolition case is critical to Indian democracy’s promise of fair play and equality.
• In the 2019 election, BJP fielded only seven Muslim candidates. In the 2017 assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, where the temple will be built and has 19.3% Muslims (about 4.40 crores), the BJP did not field any Muslim candidates. India owes it to Muslim citizens to address this sense of political marginalization.
• It was the Muslims who suffered the razing of their place of worship; they were also the victims of the violence which followed. The community sought redressal and placed its faith in the institutions for justice. The Supreme Court ruling is riddled with contradictions but its biggest problem is the loss of faith it has triggered among Muslims about the possibility of justice. What can be worse for a democracy when its largest minority group does not hope for justice but fearfully settles for a verdict that they know is no less than injustice to them? -- Arfa Khanum Sherwani writes in thewire.in
• Whatever the provocation from Pakistan and whatever the indignities and horrors inflicted on non-Muslims there, we have to deal with this minority [India’s Muslims] in a civilized manner. If we fail to do so, we shall have a festering sore. -- Jawaharlal Nehru

If Babri Masjid was still standing, would SC have had it demolished? 

-- Justice A.K. Ganguly (Retd Judge of Supreme Court)

The PM Modi's appeal for harmony, on the eve of the Ayodhya verdict, and warning against seeing the outcome as a victory or defeat for either side casts doubts about his prior knowledge and influencing the judgement. Muslims may grudgingly and helplessly accept this verdict with a pinch of salt but in the reverse scenario, Hindu groups (RSS, VHP etc) would definitely have pressurized central government to promulgate ordinance allotting Babri Masjid plot for Ram Janmabhoomi temple construction.

What Modi will do now?

Narendra Modi's spectacular win in the general elections 2019, and returning to power by an astonishing margin -- defying expectations, leaving the political opposition gutted and securing nearly two-thirds of the Lok Sabha. This election has proved how wildly popular Modi really is. The big question is: What is he going to do with that? He will probably continue along the same path.

• But there is a sizable chunk of India that voted against Modi, and many members of this anti-Modi crowd are deeply worried about his having a stronger hand.
• They see India as increasingly divided along caste and religious fault lines and an emboldened  Modi will send India farther down the path of becoming a religious Hindu state, which could be dangerous for minorities.
• Hindu extremists did very well in the election. Though Modi has not publicly used their same language, he has also done nothing yet to separate himself from them.
• Modi is not a soft liner. Modi’s deepening reliance on Amit Shah is a sign of the agenda ahead. Amit Shah is the man who recently referred to illegal Muslim immigrants as termites.
• Modi will come under pressure from within BJP to deliver on contentious planks of the party including building Ram temple over the ruins of a destroyed mosque in Ayodhya, abrogate Article 370 for Kashmir and removing special protections that allow India’s minority Muslim community to follow its own system of family law.
• Modi has no reason to deviate from the core agenda, because he received an unprecedented mandate despite the poor economic record and social disharmony.
• India’s path forward during Modi’s second term hinges on just who the real Modi might be.
• Those who studied Modi (68) say he is a complicated man: isolated, ascetic, trusting few, close to even fewer; a blend of populist, nationalist and a self-made success story. He is passionate about his Hindu beliefs and committed to economic development.
• After 5 years, the economy is not doing well and Modi is aware of how economy could define both his legacy and his future political fortunes.
• Modi has demonstrated desire to take his place on the global stage as the leader of world economic super power.
• In Kashmir, Modi might try to tighten control. So far India’s attempts to stamp out dissent have bred only growing resistance. Any further pressure put on Kashmir could mean more tension with Pakistan. Part of Modi’s election surge came from his appearing tough on Pakistan, trading military strikes across the border. The brinkmanship caused anxiety around the world, and Modi may well decide to continue that stance.
• Given the electoral victory he just won, he is unlikely to see any reason to change what has worked for him.
• At the top of his priorities is the urgency to create more jobs, and that is likely to require new laws to grant the government the power of eminent domain to seize land for companies to use to build factories.

Read  the source article

India is at the whim of one man

This election has produced the strongest government India has had. Even Jawaharlal Nehru did not have as much control over his party as Modi does. There was something surreal about this election. The fact that we've reached a point where truth does not seem to matter and that is a dangerous point for a democracy because democracy survives on the fragmentation of power. When people trust each other and distrust their leaders, you get democracy. When people distrust each other and completely trust their leaders, you get dictatorship. We are at the second moment right now. Armed with full majority, non existent opposition and tamed institutions -- Modi will continue with renewed vigor his hate filled destructive and disruptive policies. Only empty coffers, economic, agriculture and unemployment  problems will control him to certain extent.

Hindu Raj: Ambedkar’s warning

• Proponents of Hindu supremacy knew that democracy could be used to establish a Hindu Raj. They and their followers have sought to use the vote for ends of power using the Hindutva card.
• If Hindu Raj does become a fact, it will, no doubt, be the greatest calamity for this country.… Hindu Raj must be prevented at any cost - wrote B.R. Ambedkar in 1946. He was against majoritarianism, which in the Indian context meant unbridled rule of the majority community, the Hindus.
• Unfortunately for the minorities in India, Indian nationalism has developed a new doctrine which may be called the Divine Right of the Majority to rule the minorities according to the wishes of the majority. Any claim for the sharing of power by the minority is called communalism, while the monopolising of the whole power by the majority is called nationalism. Under these circumstances there is no way left but to have the rights of the Scheduled Castes embodied in the Constitution. 
• In the forties, even Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel was sometimes accused of being soft on the Hindu Revanchists, who believe in and practised tit-for-tat in that turbulent and fateful period.
• Patel’s retort to BM Birla on announcement of Independence: “I also feel happy that the announcement of June 3, 1947 at least settles things one way or the other. There is no further uncertainty. I do not think it will be possible to consider Hindustan as a Hindu state with Hinduism as the state religion. We must not forget that there are other minorities whose protection is our primary responsibility. The state must exist for all, irrespective of caste or creed.”
• Ambedkar was perceptive. It is not necessary to declare India a Hindu state formally by amending the Constitution and making Hinduism the state religion. The same result can be achieved by administrative measures. The Supreme Court has held secularism to be part of the basic structure of the Constitution which cannot be discarded even by constitutional amendment.
• Ambedkar thought that the elaborate constitutional provisions on administration would work. He told the Constituent Assembly on November 4, 1948, when he moved for the adoption of the Draft Constitution: “While everybody recognises the necessity of the diffusion of constitutional morality for the peaceful working of a democratic Constitution, there are two things interconnected with it which are not, unfortunately, generally recognised. One is that the form of administration has a close connection with the form of the Constitution. The form of the administration must be appropriate to and in the same sense as the form of the Constitution. The other is that it is perfectly possible to pervert the Constitution, without changing its form, by merely changing the form of the administration and to make it inconsistent and opposed to the spirit of the Constitution. Can we presume such a diffusion of constitutional morality? Constitutional morality is not a natural sentiment. It has to be cultivated. We must realise that our people have yet to learn it. Democracy in India is only a top-dressing on an Indian soil, which is essentially undemocratic”.
• The leaders of the Congress sought to inculcate secularism right from the first Congress held at Bombay in 1885. S. Srinivasa Aiyangar, president of the 41st Congress in 1926, articulated the credo of secularism very ably. So did Vallabhbhai Patel in the presidential address to the 45th Congress at Karachi in 1931. Hindu-Muslim “unity can only come when the majority takes courage in both hands and is prepared to change places with the minority. That would be the highest wisdom.”
• But by then, forces that did not share the Congress’ ideology, did not participate in the freedom movement and were charged with revivalist hate had come to the fore.
• Nehru once remarked that Hindu communalism was the Indian version of fascism, and, in the case of the RSS, it is not difficult to perceive certain similarities. The leader principle, the stress on militarism, the doctrine of racial-cultural superiority, ultra-nationalism infused with religious idealism, the use of symbols of past greatness, the emphasis on national solidarity, the exclusion of religious or ethnic minorities from the nation-concept—all of these features of the RSS are highly reminiscent of fascist movements in Europe.
• With an RSS pracharak, Narendra Modi, known for his antipathy towards Muslims, as Prime Minister, and Yogi Adityanath chosen by him as Chief Minister of India’s largest State, Uttar Pradesh, we have crossed the threshold to a Hindu state. The BJP’s presidential candidate, Ram Nath Kovind, is “deeply rooted in the ideological stream of the RSS”. A brand new rubber stamp has been manufactured for the Rashtrapati Bhavan, 25 years after the last rubber stamp, R. Venkataraman.
• We now have a Prime Minister whose Hindutva puts Vajpayee’s Hindutva in the shade. Lynchings of Muslims has become common. So are cries for a Hindu state. Yogi Adityanath said on the Hindu Swaraj Diwas that no Indian should be hesitant about being proud of his or her Hindu identity.
• The drive will pick up speed. Modi made blatantly communal speeches during the Uttar Pradesh election campaign, as 65 former civil servants recalled in their open letter. He will do worse for the Lok Sabha elections in 2019. He aims to claim that he has fulfilled the BJP’s triple demand. His Kashmir adventure had “solved” the problem. For a uniform civil code, no other Prime Minister has so relentlessly campaigned for a reform of Muslim law. As far as the Ram temple at Ayodhya is concerned, he will say: “have patience, I have crossed the threshold to a Hindu state in India. Can’t you see the dread on the faces of Muslims, Christians, Dalits and other minorities?

My View:
Democracy in its true spirit is rule by people. Among all models, the model of rule by majority is the most popular and probably the best. That doesn't mean that minorities can be thrashed out by majority. Rule of the law must prevail. This Hindutva philosophy will only lead to civil war, sooner or later. In a democracy, ruled by majority, it is the duty of majority to uphold the rights & dignity of minorities. Polarization of people on the lines of religion, caste or creed - is not democracy. It is only a distortion and perversion. In a society corrupted with religious extremism all constitutional provisions and laws of the land will not work properly and the country will be heading for anarchy. When constitution fails, it is mafia that rules and then nation will be heading for disintegration!