:: Antara Dev Sen

The politics of religion in our secular republic

Antara Dev Sen

May.14 : Exactly a month ago, on the first day of voting, this column had lamented the lack of issues in these elections, and how we don’t really know what we are voting for or against. Sadly, this remains true even on the last day of the polls, after five phases of voting over one whole month. There are no real issues, no big personalities, no ideologies. Just a nudge-nudge-wink-wink air of "let’s club together — see you at the bidding table later!" The post-poll arithmetic is the defining motif of these elections.

But wait. It isn’t that there’s no ideology at all. There is one. That old, dependable family retainer — secularism. There was a time when the S-word protected us from divisive sectarian forces, when it stood up to fight the devil within us, when it stopped us from giving in to our baser instincts, keeping us firmly rooted to the basic egalitarian ideology of this nation. Even now, in times of ideological distress, after sectarian riots, after bursts of ethnic cleansing, the S-word springs to the defence of the nation, steering us away from mayhem, keeping fairness and the inclusive idea of India alive.

But for almost two decades now, secularism has been an election buzz. There are secular leaders, secular parties, secular agendas, secular mindsets, secular alliances and secular governments. With so much secularism going around, how on earth do we have such a lot of religious and caste violence? And how is it that every election is dominated by mind-boggling calculations of the Muslim vote and the dalit vote and the brahmin vote?

Or are we talking of a different secularism? After all, words change their meanings. Secular once simply meant worldly, then referred to what was outside the church. Now it has taken on so many meanings that we are all free to spout the same word but talk of entirely different things.

Take how practically all parties not included in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) are talking of "all options being open" for post-poll alliances, as long as the parties are "secular". Of course, by "secular" they mean anybody other than the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP), which has been identified as the leading sectarian party in the fray, closely followed by the larger saffron clan, including the Shiv Sena. This is not without reason, since the Hindutva parties have been trying to bring down our secular democratic traditions for years now, slowly turning India into a motherland of Hindus. And when Narendra Modi, widely believed to be the architect of the 2002 Gujarat massacre of Muslims, is projected as a prime ministerial candidate, the fear of being swallowed up by sectarian forces looms bigger than ever.

However, that’s where our secularism stops. And any old party or leader not ostensibly part of the Hindutva undivided family is free to join the "secular" forces. So you find the old secularist Congress desperately wooing Nitish Kumar — in spite of his obvious warmth and clasping camaraderie towards Mr Modi. In Bengal, they have already hugged drama queen Mamata Banerjee, earlier a staunch ally of the BJP, who refused to quit the NDA even after the Gujarat massacre.

Religion and caste have always dominated our politics, and in the interest of transparency I am glad these have now come to the surface. The Muslim vote has always been of great importance — and in these elections they seem to be the dominant concern. The various "secular" parties can’t get their eyes off the Muslim votebank. But it is not easy to balance caste concerns of dominant Hindus and woo the Muslims — as dear old Mulayam Singh Yadav, once known as Maulana Mulayam, has discovered. His attempt to get the backward caste vote by welcoming Kalyan Singh, the Babri Masjid demolition man, has seriously alienated the Muslims, leading to high drama and salacious attacks within the party.

In fact, we are so confused about secularism, that now L.K. Advani claims that the BJP is India’s only truly secular party. I forget his interesting logic.

Not that our foreparents had a clear idea of secularism. Unlike the stoutly non-religious Jawaharlal Nehru, Mahatma Gandhi believed religion permeates every sphere, including politics. "Those who say politics has nothing to do with religion do not know what religion means", he said. But that did not stop him from advocating a secular state way before Independence was achieved. "What conflict of interest can there be between Hindus and Muslims in the matter of revenue, sanitation, police, justice, or the use of public conveniences?" he said. "The difference can only be in religious usage and observance with which a secular state has no concern".

In real terms, Gandhi’s sarva dharma sambhava (respectful co-existence of all religions) was essentially not very different from Jawaharlal Nehru’s idea of secularism. "We have to get rid of that narrowing religious outlook", said Nehru, lashing out against the "obsession" with supernatural speculations and religious emotionalism, against "blind belief, dogma, bigotry". Nehru’s secular state would offer "freedom of religion and conscience, including freedom for those who may have no religion". And between Gandhi and Nehru, we got a clearly secular Indian state, which would be equidistant from all religions yet respect all religions equally.

Unfortunately, six decades later, India still has a tough time living up to this idea of a secular state. Given the enormous pluralism and poverty among a billion people, it isn’t easy to have "a state which honours all faiths equally and gives them equal opportunities". In fact, there are scholars who believe that the notion of a secular state impartial to religion is bound to fail and can never prevent the marginalisation of — or violence against — religious minorities. But maybe that is a failure not of the idea of secularism but of our appeasement-oriented interpretation of it, and failure to implement the original idea of secularism as neutrality.

The elections make you blush as you follow our leaders’ clandestine, adulterous games with religious and caste sentiments. But soon the polls will be over, so we are ready to wink at all this. For in spite of such electoral games, one can attempt to be secular. Real secularism of a state lies in a government, judiciary and civil society that is truly impartial in matters of faith. And unless we seriously attempt to pack off religion from the public space, we can’t have that. Anyway, religion is a personal matter. Our gods are private.

Antara Dev Sen is editor of The Little Magazine. She can be contacted at: sen@littlemag.com