Thursday, December 13, 2012
Plights of Muslim Dalits in Kashmir
Friday, June 10, 2011
Nitish Kumar must answer
4 dead, 15 police bullets into protesting villagers test Nitish
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Santosh Singh
Tags : Police firing in Araria, Muslims killed, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Patna Medical College
Posted: Sat Jun 11 2011, 00:43 hrs
Patna:
The death of four people, all Muslims, in last Friday’s police firing in Araria, including a seven-month-old infant and a pregnant woman, is turning out to be a major embarrassment for the Nitish Kumar government.
It has ordered a judicial probe but now faces charges of police brutality and political patronage. For, the son of a Katihar BJP legislator is the co-owner of the proposed maize starch factory in Forbesganj, the object of the protests. Villagers allege that the boundary wall meant for the factory will cut off the link road to their village. The district administration has offered an alternative road but villagers were divided over it when they protested last Friday and were fired upon.
Each of the victims has a story of police callousness and neglect. Tahiran Khatoon lost her 18-year-old son Mustaq Ansari. She says her son, who ran a betel shop to support the family, was on his way to offer Friday prayers when he was picked up by police who fired four bullets into his torso and after the boy fell down, kicked him and waited for him to die.
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Mustaq is one of the four killed in police firing in Araria, an incident which is turning out to be a major embarrassment for the Bihar government. Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has ordered a judicial inquiry as victims’ families reached Patna today.
Distraught grandfather Rafiq Ansari said his seven-month-old grandson Naushad, being carried by his mother Tahine Khatoon, was killed by two bullets in his back. Tahine is recovering at the Patna Medical College and Hospital. Shazmin Khatoon, 27, who was pregnant, was killed by six bullets. Amina Khatoon’s son Mukhtar Ansari, 22, was killed after he received four police bullets including three in his head.
The postmortem report revealed that 15 of 16 bullets hit upper parts of victims’ bodies.
Bihar Industrial Area Development Authority (BIADA) gave 33 acres on lease to Auro Sundaram International Private Limited, jointly owned by Saurav Agrawal, son of Katihar BJP MLC Ashok Agrawal and Uttarkhand businessman Ashok Choudhary.
The Rs 130-crore project, due to start by 2012, will manufacture maize starch and 13 other products including
glucose. A 3MW captive power plant is also part of the project.
The victims’ families claim they have been using the road — now falling in the proposed factory premises — for the last 50 years. Questioning the fact that no compensation has been paid, the victims allege that Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi did little to defuse tension when he visited Araria on May 29.
Modi told The Indian Express: “I had gone to Araria to attend a personal function and had no knowledge of the Forbesganj factory problem. Ashok Agrawal is a businessman and his son got the BIADA land after having fulfilled all norms”.
He said that whatever happened was “unfortunate and condemnable”.
Katihar MLC Ashok Agrawal said he became an MLC after his son got the BIADA land. He blamed the incident
on the local political fight between the village mukhiya and his rival.
Said Nitish Kumar: “The government has already instituted judicial inquiry into the incident. The government will go by findings of the inquiry report and act accordingly”.
Share |
Santosh Singh
Tags : Police firing in Araria, Muslims killed, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, Patna Medical College
Posted: Sat Jun 11 2011, 00:43 hrs
Patna:
The death of four people, all Muslims, in last Friday’s police firing in Araria, including a seven-month-old infant and a pregnant woman, is turning out to be a major embarrassment for the Nitish Kumar government.
It has ordered a judicial probe but now faces charges of police brutality and political patronage. For, the son of a Katihar BJP legislator is the co-owner of the proposed maize starch factory in Forbesganj, the object of the protests. Villagers allege that the boundary wall meant for the factory will cut off the link road to their village. The district administration has offered an alternative road but villagers were divided over it when they protested last Friday and were fired upon.
Each of the victims has a story of police callousness and neglect. Tahiran Khatoon lost her 18-year-old son Mustaq Ansari. She says her son, who ran a betel shop to support the family, was on his way to offer Friday prayers when he was picked up by police who fired four bullets into his torso and after the boy fell down, kicked him and waited for him to die.
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Mustaq is one of the four killed in police firing in Araria, an incident which is turning out to be a major embarrassment for the Bihar government. Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has ordered a judicial inquiry as victims’ families reached Patna today.
Distraught grandfather Rafiq Ansari said his seven-month-old grandson Naushad, being carried by his mother Tahine Khatoon, was killed by two bullets in his back. Tahine is recovering at the Patna Medical College and Hospital. Shazmin Khatoon, 27, who was pregnant, was killed by six bullets. Amina Khatoon’s son Mukhtar Ansari, 22, was killed after he received four police bullets including three in his head.
The postmortem report revealed that 15 of 16 bullets hit upper parts of victims’ bodies.
Bihar Industrial Area Development Authority (BIADA) gave 33 acres on lease to Auro Sundaram International Private Limited, jointly owned by Saurav Agrawal, son of Katihar BJP MLC Ashok Agrawal and Uttarkhand businessman Ashok Choudhary.
The Rs 130-crore project, due to start by 2012, will manufacture maize starch and 13 other products including
glucose. A 3MW captive power plant is also part of the project.
The victims’ families claim they have been using the road — now falling in the proposed factory premises — for the last 50 years. Questioning the fact that no compensation has been paid, the victims allege that Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi did little to defuse tension when he visited Araria on May 29.
Modi told The Indian Express: “I had gone to Araria to attend a personal function and had no knowledge of the Forbesganj factory problem. Ashok Agrawal is a businessman and his son got the BIADA land after having fulfilled all norms”.
He said that whatever happened was “unfortunate and condemnable”.
Katihar MLC Ashok Agrawal said he became an MLC after his son got the BIADA land. He blamed the incident
on the local political fight between the village mukhiya and his rival.
Said Nitish Kumar: “The government has already instituted judicial inquiry into the incident. The government will go by findings of the inquiry report and act accordingly”.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
India in darkness
In Memory of Sai Baba
By Vidya Bhushan Rawat
The 'immortal' remains of Sai Bab will be buried tomorrow. His followers and devout worshippers are crying and moaning that he had claimed he would die at the age of 96. Instead, he died at the age of 85. I think the devout Bhaktas are wrong as Sai did not claim anything which he was unable to do. Definitely, he knew about his day of death. I am sure, his father must have put his age in the school head master's record book, much below his actual age. That is why Sai is proved wrong. He must be 96 as he died. I can not be 85 as being informed to us. I believe in Sai. He did so many miracles which many street side Madari wallahs used to do. Many of our friends had already exposed his tricks. But, I suppose the biggest trick was his age. So, his devotees must not say that Sai will come back. He can not as he was required some where else. He did not die. Who says so. He will always be in the heart of his devotees. Don't you see how our country is moaning. Sachin is crying, Sunil Gavaskar is shocked, Amitabh is blogging, Manmohan and Sonia have grim faces, Andhra Pradesh government is not functioning. The country, it seems, have stopped functioning. The only thing that is happening is IPL. Cant these IPL wallahs, half of whom may be the devotees of Sai Baba, make an announcement to culminate the game and declare 'Deccan Chargers' as winner for this year, in memory of Sai.
All our celebraties are moaning but not ready to leave their penny for a year. Let them say that they would donate the whole years earning in memory of Sai. Ordinary devotees are crying, beating their chests as police is not allowing them. What will happen to them ? How will India move forward. India does not remain in darkness despite no electrity and no literacy but Sai's death has plunged the entire country into darkness. Are people able to see each other ? Oh, I see, the only light it seems is in the India TV and all other TV channles, who are doing their duty painstakingly for the whole day and night. India is in trouble. What to do ?
Adwani, Sonia, Sachin, Amitabh all are together in their sorrow. How great this unity is ? I think, it will not take much pursuasion for them to declare Sai Baba as Bharat Ratna. None will have any question. Sachin would be happy so would be Gavaskar, Advani, Togadia, Sonia and all others would always nod as Sai's greatness crosses all the barriers. All our bureacrats will be more than happy to clear the files. And president Pratibha Patil wont take much time in signing the recommendation from the Central cabinet. In many years, this will be the greatest unity in Parliament which is not running smoothly. All the political parties may pass a resolution to grant Sai Baba as Bharat Ratna as he fits into everything, a great spiritual leader, a magician who attracted every one, a social worker who provided water to even the athiests in Tamilnadu. One can see how Karnunanidhi is so sad. But is Karunanidhi sad because Sai provided water or because he was a backward community person. At least some backward was able to bring Brahmins, Banias, Goras, Kalas all together. How great it is that the Brahmanism in India is back to life with the greatness of Sai Baba. Ofcourse, backwards are already donning great seats there. After Sai baba we have other Babas ready to serve the Manu Smiriti.
Sai has gone. I have no intention to show disrespect to him. He deserve our respect but not the way these forces want us to do. We refuse to believe in all those miracles which he claimed. They remain hollow. India is a country where more than 75% of its population is still earning less than 1/2 dollar a day. We do not decent living for our people. We do not have electricity, petrol and food security. A majority of its poor live in abject poverty. Our state leaders have looted everything that we had. I know Sai can not do anything. He could not save himself. He had to die. But the myth that he created around him at the end is exposed. Those who thought tht he would die on his own are shocked. Those who thought he can not die are unable to believe. May be his ghost might haunt them. Who knows tomorrow, some of these deovotees claim that they have 'Sai's atma in them. And after that we all know how much money we have in india in these Bhoot Prets. The books published by Geeta Press would sale like hot cake. Hari om Sharan will resing hanuman chalisa and everything will be as usual as it is. People will achieve everything after going to Sai Samadhi. We will have annual Urs there and dignitries and celebraties will attend that. And India's problem will be solved there. We will only hear on TV who wore what. Who was accompanying whome and what was Priyanka Chopra wearing and so on. So, we will have a lot of work after wards at the Sai Ashram. Praveen Togadia has already warned government not to attempt intervening in Sai's property. Togadia know it well that government wont touch his property as Sai's ghost can come in the dreams of Man Mohan Singh to haunt him so none will touch. And the local Babus do not have the 'haisiyat' to count the money that Sai have. I can not count the numbers.. so many thousands crores.. Oh, difficult and mythological money like the myth of Sai. So, money will remain mysterious till a Julian Assange takes the challenge and try to count them.
In the meanwhile, the devotees can multifold the property by different ways. India is known to have deep respect for its leaders and spiritual leaders. We can start by acquiring several acres land in Delhi, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Chennai, Banglore and Kolkata at the first phase to erect Sai Memorial. Other cities can follow later. It is important that Sai become a money spinning machine so that millions of job can be created for the new priests. Already, we have to think that astrology is a science as being claimed by the Vaidiks and we can not allow our brahmins to be out of job hence it is important that education must provide job to all. So, these new Sai institutions can create best funds for our new generations and imbibe brahmanical cultural values in our children so that we can wait for miracles in future too and remain far away from enlightenment.
As I am writing this, I get the news that Andhra Pradesh police has extended the deadline for 'antim darshan' of Sai Baba till late in the night. I am sure tomorrow they will complete the task of burrying him otherwise there might be problem. All of those who have not taken the antim darshan, should do it fast, as there is no space in the TV studios afterwards. They can not show all the time people crying and crying. A big event is waiting in London. And we all are ready to see our former colonial masters getting ready for the big bash. Each of the bhaktas would be keen to see Kate and the prince kissing each other at the Balcony of their Royal Palace. The same anchors will be smiling and talking about dignitries and celebraties albiet in a different way this time. And the show will go on..
By Vidya Bhushan Rawat
The 'immortal' remains of Sai Bab will be buried tomorrow. His followers and devout worshippers are crying and moaning that he had claimed he would die at the age of 96. Instead, he died at the age of 85. I think the devout Bhaktas are wrong as Sai did not claim anything which he was unable to do. Definitely, he knew about his day of death. I am sure, his father must have put his age in the school head master's record book, much below his actual age. That is why Sai is proved wrong. He must be 96 as he died. I can not be 85 as being informed to us. I believe in Sai. He did so many miracles which many street side Madari wallahs used to do. Many of our friends had already exposed his tricks. But, I suppose the biggest trick was his age. So, his devotees must not say that Sai will come back. He can not as he was required some where else. He did not die. Who says so. He will always be in the heart of his devotees. Don't you see how our country is moaning. Sachin is crying, Sunil Gavaskar is shocked, Amitabh is blogging, Manmohan and Sonia have grim faces, Andhra Pradesh government is not functioning. The country, it seems, have stopped functioning. The only thing that is happening is IPL. Cant these IPL wallahs, half of whom may be the devotees of Sai Baba, make an announcement to culminate the game and declare 'Deccan Chargers' as winner for this year, in memory of Sai.
All our celebraties are moaning but not ready to leave their penny for a year. Let them say that they would donate the whole years earning in memory of Sai. Ordinary devotees are crying, beating their chests as police is not allowing them. What will happen to them ? How will India move forward. India does not remain in darkness despite no electrity and no literacy but Sai's death has plunged the entire country into darkness. Are people able to see each other ? Oh, I see, the only light it seems is in the India TV and all other TV channles, who are doing their duty painstakingly for the whole day and night. India is in trouble. What to do ?
Adwani, Sonia, Sachin, Amitabh all are together in their sorrow. How great this unity is ? I think, it will not take much pursuasion for them to declare Sai Baba as Bharat Ratna. None will have any question. Sachin would be happy so would be Gavaskar, Advani, Togadia, Sonia and all others would always nod as Sai's greatness crosses all the barriers. All our bureacrats will be more than happy to clear the files. And president Pratibha Patil wont take much time in signing the recommendation from the Central cabinet. In many years, this will be the greatest unity in Parliament which is not running smoothly. All the political parties may pass a resolution to grant Sai Baba as Bharat Ratna as he fits into everything, a great spiritual leader, a magician who attracted every one, a social worker who provided water to even the athiests in Tamilnadu. One can see how Karnunanidhi is so sad. But is Karunanidhi sad because Sai provided water or because he was a backward community person. At least some backward was able to bring Brahmins, Banias, Goras, Kalas all together. How great it is that the Brahmanism in India is back to life with the greatness of Sai Baba. Ofcourse, backwards are already donning great seats there. After Sai baba we have other Babas ready to serve the Manu Smiriti.
Sai has gone. I have no intention to show disrespect to him. He deserve our respect but not the way these forces want us to do. We refuse to believe in all those miracles which he claimed. They remain hollow. India is a country where more than 75% of its population is still earning less than 1/2 dollar a day. We do not decent living for our people. We do not have electricity, petrol and food security. A majority of its poor live in abject poverty. Our state leaders have looted everything that we had. I know Sai can not do anything. He could not save himself. He had to die. But the myth that he created around him at the end is exposed. Those who thought tht he would die on his own are shocked. Those who thought he can not die are unable to believe. May be his ghost might haunt them. Who knows tomorrow, some of these deovotees claim that they have 'Sai's atma in them. And after that we all know how much money we have in india in these Bhoot Prets. The books published by Geeta Press would sale like hot cake. Hari om Sharan will resing hanuman chalisa and everything will be as usual as it is. People will achieve everything after going to Sai Samadhi. We will have annual Urs there and dignitries and celebraties will attend that. And India's problem will be solved there. We will only hear on TV who wore what. Who was accompanying whome and what was Priyanka Chopra wearing and so on. So, we will have a lot of work after wards at the Sai Ashram. Praveen Togadia has already warned government not to attempt intervening in Sai's property. Togadia know it well that government wont touch his property as Sai's ghost can come in the dreams of Man Mohan Singh to haunt him so none will touch. And the local Babus do not have the 'haisiyat' to count the money that Sai have. I can not count the numbers.. so many thousands crores.. Oh, difficult and mythological money like the myth of Sai. So, money will remain mysterious till a Julian Assange takes the challenge and try to count them.
In the meanwhile, the devotees can multifold the property by different ways. India is known to have deep respect for its leaders and spiritual leaders. We can start by acquiring several acres land in Delhi, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Chennai, Banglore and Kolkata at the first phase to erect Sai Memorial. Other cities can follow later. It is important that Sai become a money spinning machine so that millions of job can be created for the new priests. Already, we have to think that astrology is a science as being claimed by the Vaidiks and we can not allow our brahmins to be out of job hence it is important that education must provide job to all. So, these new Sai institutions can create best funds for our new generations and imbibe brahmanical cultural values in our children so that we can wait for miracles in future too and remain far away from enlightenment.
As I am writing this, I get the news that Andhra Pradesh police has extended the deadline for 'antim darshan' of Sai Baba till late in the night. I am sure tomorrow they will complete the task of burrying him otherwise there might be problem. All of those who have not taken the antim darshan, should do it fast, as there is no space in the TV studios afterwards. They can not show all the time people crying and crying. A big event is waiting in London. And we all are ready to see our former colonial masters getting ready for the big bash. Each of the bhaktas would be keen to see Kate and the prince kissing each other at the Balcony of their Royal Palace. The same anchors will be smiling and talking about dignitries and celebraties albiet in a different way this time. And the show will go on..
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
The Crisis of Zari Zardosi work in Uttar-Pradesh
The crisis of Zari-zardosi work in Uttar-Pradesh
Shabanam’s struggle for dignity and honor
By Vidya Bhushan Rawat
She is about 28 year old living in a very dilapidated structure of Muraintola near Lala Bazar, in the nondescript district Fatehpur of Uttar-Pradesh, about 150 kilometer from Allahabad and nearly 70 kilometer from Kanpur town. Once a constituency of former prime minister V.P.Singh, Fatehpur is a rural district lacking basic developmental facilities with a fairly large number of backward community people living along with Dalits and Muslims. Shabanam has graduated in Urdu language from a local women’s college. Two of her elder sisters got married many years back but now the burden of her family rest on her. She lost her father Babu Ali Khan when she was just studying in the IIIrd standard. None in her family was literate but she wanted to study. As the financial condition of her family was worst, a thought to get admission in the school was nearly impossible without a strong support. She had three brothers who were elder to her, too worked at the local shops and her mother worked as domestic labour. Somehow she completed her VIIIth and the family people asked her to stop then lacking financial resources. Fact is that more than the financial resources it is the labour resources that they want from their children. The family was in to Beedi making and also doing the zari-zardosi work which was actually not able to sustain the family as the payments were low and exploitation high. It is an organised crime against these unorganised people, a regular perpetuation of criminality mixed in class, gender and religious bias. One of her sisters actually understood her ambition to study further and promised that she would support her in studies. That helped Shabnam in completing her 10th standard. Unfortunately, her sister who supported her died leaving her future to further uncertainties. Yet, she decided that whatever happens she would study further. She understood well that for that she needed economic independence. She started making Beedis in the night and used to go college in the morning which helped her completing her graduation. Her three brothers were illiterate and did not show any interest in education. Two of them were into tailoring work while the third one was a carpenter. All of them got married somehow and were living with their families. In fact, running the family was solely the duty of Shabnam. In a sad turn of event, her younger brother died leaving his wife and child to be fetched by Shabnam. When we see the home they live in, it shows their desperation. In the absence of the state’s duty, most of the Muslims masses are destined to feed themselves in such a way as Shabnam is doing. They have no idea that they have certain rights too envisaged in the constitution and that the government need to honour them. It is tragic that the community is living in such a state that its political class has no time to look beyond its narrow and self cantered political agenda while those playing secular politics are just not able to look beyond their narrow political agenda.
Shabnam’s trial did not end with the death of her brother. Nearly three months after her brother had died, her sister in law also passed away leaving her baby in her hands. One of her elder brother live with her family but his income is not enough to feed his three children. The macabre dance of deaths that Shabnam witnessed in her family can’t be just coincident but the brutal fact of prevailing health conditions among the artisans working in beedi and zardosi work. They suffer silently and before they could realise that some disease has caught them, it is too late. These young deaths are brutal reminder of complete failure of state, civil society and our governance system to look beyond the traditional work of ‘development’. Developmental agenda of our country has still remained biased towards Muslims and fail to provide them any alternatives and support despite their efforts to continue with age old traditions and occupations particularly in terms of arts and music which clearly is our national heritage.
At the moment, Shabnam is actually the guardian of her mother, her elder sister who is not married and the 10 years old son of her brother. The family lives in a desperate situation. The rooms are dark with virtual no air or light. Looking like shell of an old jail, you can find here the aging and isolated Muslim population living in disgusting conditions, of course with smiling faces. Dr Salim, an old man in his seventies who claims to be a ‘doctor’ owns this dilapidated structure with about five tenants each paying nearly Rs 500/- as rent. One can understand what could be the living conditions of these houses in such an amount. The ‘doctor’ himself needs a doctor as age has caught him and his condition look grim and pathetic. The rent, perhaps, is the only source of his survival as one does not know whether he still ‘practices’ or not.
Shabnam lives in one of these rooms with her family. The dirty lanes that leads to her home in Murain Tola, Fatehpur, openly speak about the seriousness of the local authorities related to Muslim community particularly those who are living in depressing conditions. Most of the occupants, here live in dark single rooms and mostly engaged in the handicraft work. At the rooftop, Shabnam introduce me to another zardosi worker Naseema Khatoon, who has started her morning work. It is just 9 am and yet most of the people had started working on their ‘projects’. Naseema has three children and her husband is a tailor master. I asked her about her life, her earnings, her fears and future which she feels remain uncertain at the moment. And according to her, ‘It is painful living with no security of life and family as each one suffer as running a home in these time of inflation is nearly impossible’. She does the Zardosi work and could earn Rs 20-25 per day. A deep sense of insecurity and uncertainty looms large over her face as she does not want to speak saying what is the outcome of speaking to you? People come and report but our plight remain the same, says, Naseema. With no fixed income and no social security such as a BPL card which could enable them to procure the essential commodities in fair prices, life is harder. One does not really know why the ‘pro poor’ programmes have not reached the Muslims. Shabnam says that so many houses were constructed in the name of poor like Kanshiram Shahari Avaas Yojna, Indira Awas Yojna, Balmiki Ambedkar Avas Yojana and nowhere did even a single person from her community got a house. Isn’t it a bias in our governance structure and its so-called anti-poverty programmes that have left the poor Muslim in the belief that she does not have right?
As Shabnam takes me to another house of another family engaged in this work which does not fulfil their minimum daily needs, the same question comes in my mind as why despite hard work these families are most marginalised. Meena is on the work at the compound of her home in the early hours. Despite working all through the day, the four sisters still find it very difficult to get going. They have no support from any quarters for their survival. No ration card and no job security. ‘ We lost our father several years back. He was a scooter mechanic and my younger sister now looks after his work’, said a Meena who remains illiterate and yet has a zeal to study. They are five sisters in all in which one is married. At this small kuchcha home, these four sisters live together and earn their living. Meena’s elder sister Asma is looking after her father’s work in the mechanic shop and repair cycle and scooters. Actually, this family is related to Shabnam and like her these girls are taking care of their own families with all what they could do. I have the same question about their studies and most of them actually suggest that they want to study but circumstances have forced them to be in this work. ‘Don’t you think this art will die, if you people also leave this work in the absent of fair compensation?’, I ask. ‘You see the problem is not the work but our financial capacity. Most of the work is actually not coming directly to these artisans. The middlemen in Kanpur and Delhi actually procure orders from the businessmen and then give it to us on a very low rate, says Shabnam. In the market, the stuff created by these artisans is appreciated and have large buyers but behind these beautiful creations are some bitter truth of negligence, exploitation and painful living conditions. Most of the people engaged in this work suffer from eye sight problems, migraine etc. Since this work does not fetch enough money to run even a single person’s life, young woman like Shabanam take to other work of Beedi making which add to their miseries further. As an instant rehabilitation, it might help them earn some money but make them vulnerable to other diseases like tuberculosis and skin diseases. The women chose beedi making due to various social stigmas attach to her particularly when she venture out. In such a society, it would be difficult for a working woman to survive if any day her name is attached to someone. Most of the time, women do not feel safe in going out and as they are illiterate hence it would not be possible for them to get even a safe job except domestic worker which too is very limited in the town. Asma, elder sister of Meena runs a scooter and cycles repair shop in the market. As I go along with Shabnam to speak to her, she does not feel comfortable in speaking to me. She earn about Rs 3000 per month which goes in running her house. ‘Many reporters came here and written about me and appreciated of my work but I am not comfortable doing this work’, she says and adds that ‘ It is not a worthwhile work for woman like me as people gaze at me and speak about me when I lie down to repair the scooter or fix the puncture. I am not doing this work at my own’. ‘ If I get an opportunity and some funds, I will leave this work and venture into cosmetic shop which is more ‘respectable’, she says. This shows the concerns, pain and fears of Muslim women who do something different yet feel deeply disturbed with the turn of events.
To run her living shabnam does zari-zardosi work and in the night from 9 pm till 1.30 she makes beedis so that she could earn some extra bucks to run her family. She works with a local nongovernmental organisation too but all this could not provide her a stable Rs 3,000 per month to run the family. It is tragic that such a hard working woman with great ideas has to suffer. The tension looks in her eyes. She is frustrated as nothing seems to be working at the moment. The art that we appreciate so much does not fetch her anything.
Today, there are one thousand such zardosi workers in Fatehpur town and most of them living in deeply difficult situation. Life is virtual hell for them as they seem to have no way forward. They are destined to live in such inhuman condition. For the beautiful art work that they do on the salwar-kameez which might be appreciated at Delhi market as superb, these people get a meagre amount. They are able to complete the work in 4 days on a Kurta and that too not alone as other also support them but the returns are very low. It is rather unfortunate and exploitative that for this much of work a girl earns nearly Rs 40-60 per piece which is completed in four days. In a month period, most of them do not even earn Rs 400-500/-. The men have better chances as they are paid more but still their earning too is less than Rs 3,000 /- a month if everything goes fine and the work is regular. Last year, I was informed, that a majority of them suffered under the Chinese invasion. Most of the new work was coming from China virtually making these artisans workless but today the situation seems to change as the customers have realised that the hand work is much better in quality than the mechanical one. And therefore, this year there was more work though it too is seasonal.
Shabanam want to unite the workers and start something for them. The frustration comes in hear heart and in her talks quite often. She is angry as nothing materialise here despite publication of articles and many people ‘photographing’ here. Newsmen come here and publish our stories in their newspapers but so far nothing has changed in their lives. The ‘developmental’ programmes have never reached pasmanda Muslims. They are virtually left out by the powerful leaders. None of these people have a BPL ration card even when most of them are living in abject poverty. Shabanam’s widowed mother has no pension, no other support. The family conditions forced Shabnam to apply for a job in the municipality but there too she was asked to pay Rs 70,000 as bribe for contract work which she was unable to pay.
Shabanam moves around in Burqa but very confident of her own self as she is able to earn something but the anguish of having an elder sister who is not married yet and an old mother who does not get anything, reflects in her eyes. There is no fixed salary for her and earning even Rs 3,000 is a rare thing in today’s time. She mocks at the government schemes of pretending to provide support to people. ‘Where is the support’, she ask? We are not even asking government to pay us, all we want is a fair deal in creating these beautiful stuff. We all know that in the international market these things are sold at a very high price but we are unable to get anything. We suffer while making other joyous.
While both men and women have faced tremendous pressure from the modern market here. She says, people appreciate art work and machine cannot really replace their art. But at the same point of time, people must pay for it. When I ask as why she has not been able to make a union of the people, she replies that now she is willing to work if people support the cause, she may take up. At the moment, she has her priorities to work for her family but definitely she does not want to sit silently and suffer. Most of the artisans cannot send their children to school as it is difficult to finish work on time and hence they engage their children too. There is no social security, health benefit and this art work actually affect their eye sight and beedi work makes them vulnerable to tuberculosis and breathing problems.
They are always indebted and the contractors use it. Women are not able to go out and remain under tremendous social pressure. This work is seasonal and hence artisans remain workless for many months. The contractors do not pay on time and for many months. Their own money is treated as advance and used as a tool of exploitation.
Shabanam’s eyes are asking various questions to me. But after hearing from many people she has this hope also that her voice and feeling will go to people who can think of saving this art. ‘Have you heard about Narega’, I ask. Yes, ‘ I know about it and they get Rs 100/- for their 8 hours work while we work to save this art and yet Rs 100 is a dream for us even in the three-four days. What an irony’, she says.
I have refused to accept defeat even in the darkest hour of life as these circumstances are created by our society and apathy. Democracy does not mean anything to them as it failed to protect them. They do not even know whether they have rights to get a dignified return for their work. Those who fight in their names have failed to benefits as most of these war cry’s actually created leaders and do not really resolve the issues of the people. Travelling different parts of India and speaking to various path breakers such as Shabanam is always a refreshing experience that people are still hopeful and have that ability to live their life in happiness and whatever they possess. They are exploring new ways despite the marginalisation created by the system in the past so many years. They are hope of the country even in these hours of gloom that so-called liberalisation has brought in their lives. I have seen in the eyes of Shabanam the hope for future and the courage, which is essential in these moments of crisis. One is sincerely hoping that there will be people who will be able to support such initiatives which can bring cheers in the lives of these people, our own Zardosi workers, who makes our brides beautiful, our boys look handsome and have kept our art alive despite all their pains and troubles.
Shabanam’s struggle for dignity and honor
By Vidya Bhushan Rawat
She is about 28 year old living in a very dilapidated structure of Muraintola near Lala Bazar, in the nondescript district Fatehpur of Uttar-Pradesh, about 150 kilometer from Allahabad and nearly 70 kilometer from Kanpur town. Once a constituency of former prime minister V.P.Singh, Fatehpur is a rural district lacking basic developmental facilities with a fairly large number of backward community people living along with Dalits and Muslims. Shabanam has graduated in Urdu language from a local women’s college. Two of her elder sisters got married many years back but now the burden of her family rest on her. She lost her father Babu Ali Khan when she was just studying in the IIIrd standard. None in her family was literate but she wanted to study. As the financial condition of her family was worst, a thought to get admission in the school was nearly impossible without a strong support. She had three brothers who were elder to her, too worked at the local shops and her mother worked as domestic labour. Somehow she completed her VIIIth and the family people asked her to stop then lacking financial resources. Fact is that more than the financial resources it is the labour resources that they want from their children. The family was in to Beedi making and also doing the zari-zardosi work which was actually not able to sustain the family as the payments were low and exploitation high. It is an organised crime against these unorganised people, a regular perpetuation of criminality mixed in class, gender and religious bias. One of her sisters actually understood her ambition to study further and promised that she would support her in studies. That helped Shabnam in completing her 10th standard. Unfortunately, her sister who supported her died leaving her future to further uncertainties. Yet, she decided that whatever happens she would study further. She understood well that for that she needed economic independence. She started making Beedis in the night and used to go college in the morning which helped her completing her graduation. Her three brothers were illiterate and did not show any interest in education. Two of them were into tailoring work while the third one was a carpenter. All of them got married somehow and were living with their families. In fact, running the family was solely the duty of Shabnam. In a sad turn of event, her younger brother died leaving his wife and child to be fetched by Shabnam. When we see the home they live in, it shows their desperation. In the absence of the state’s duty, most of the Muslims masses are destined to feed themselves in such a way as Shabnam is doing. They have no idea that they have certain rights too envisaged in the constitution and that the government need to honour them. It is tragic that the community is living in such a state that its political class has no time to look beyond its narrow and self cantered political agenda while those playing secular politics are just not able to look beyond their narrow political agenda.
Shabnam’s trial did not end with the death of her brother. Nearly three months after her brother had died, her sister in law also passed away leaving her baby in her hands. One of her elder brother live with her family but his income is not enough to feed his three children. The macabre dance of deaths that Shabnam witnessed in her family can’t be just coincident but the brutal fact of prevailing health conditions among the artisans working in beedi and zardosi work. They suffer silently and before they could realise that some disease has caught them, it is too late. These young deaths are brutal reminder of complete failure of state, civil society and our governance system to look beyond the traditional work of ‘development’. Developmental agenda of our country has still remained biased towards Muslims and fail to provide them any alternatives and support despite their efforts to continue with age old traditions and occupations particularly in terms of arts and music which clearly is our national heritage.
At the moment, Shabnam is actually the guardian of her mother, her elder sister who is not married and the 10 years old son of her brother. The family lives in a desperate situation. The rooms are dark with virtual no air or light. Looking like shell of an old jail, you can find here the aging and isolated Muslim population living in disgusting conditions, of course with smiling faces. Dr Salim, an old man in his seventies who claims to be a ‘doctor’ owns this dilapidated structure with about five tenants each paying nearly Rs 500/- as rent. One can understand what could be the living conditions of these houses in such an amount. The ‘doctor’ himself needs a doctor as age has caught him and his condition look grim and pathetic. The rent, perhaps, is the only source of his survival as one does not know whether he still ‘practices’ or not.
Shabnam lives in one of these rooms with her family. The dirty lanes that leads to her home in Murain Tola, Fatehpur, openly speak about the seriousness of the local authorities related to Muslim community particularly those who are living in depressing conditions. Most of the occupants, here live in dark single rooms and mostly engaged in the handicraft work. At the rooftop, Shabnam introduce me to another zardosi worker Naseema Khatoon, who has started her morning work. It is just 9 am and yet most of the people had started working on their ‘projects’. Naseema has three children and her husband is a tailor master. I asked her about her life, her earnings, her fears and future which she feels remain uncertain at the moment. And according to her, ‘It is painful living with no security of life and family as each one suffer as running a home in these time of inflation is nearly impossible’. She does the Zardosi work and could earn Rs 20-25 per day. A deep sense of insecurity and uncertainty looms large over her face as she does not want to speak saying what is the outcome of speaking to you? People come and report but our plight remain the same, says, Naseema. With no fixed income and no social security such as a BPL card which could enable them to procure the essential commodities in fair prices, life is harder. One does not really know why the ‘pro poor’ programmes have not reached the Muslims. Shabnam says that so many houses were constructed in the name of poor like Kanshiram Shahari Avaas Yojna, Indira Awas Yojna, Balmiki Ambedkar Avas Yojana and nowhere did even a single person from her community got a house. Isn’t it a bias in our governance structure and its so-called anti-poverty programmes that have left the poor Muslim in the belief that she does not have right?
As Shabnam takes me to another house of another family engaged in this work which does not fulfil their minimum daily needs, the same question comes in my mind as why despite hard work these families are most marginalised. Meena is on the work at the compound of her home in the early hours. Despite working all through the day, the four sisters still find it very difficult to get going. They have no support from any quarters for their survival. No ration card and no job security. ‘ We lost our father several years back. He was a scooter mechanic and my younger sister now looks after his work’, said a Meena who remains illiterate and yet has a zeal to study. They are five sisters in all in which one is married. At this small kuchcha home, these four sisters live together and earn their living. Meena’s elder sister Asma is looking after her father’s work in the mechanic shop and repair cycle and scooters. Actually, this family is related to Shabnam and like her these girls are taking care of their own families with all what they could do. I have the same question about their studies and most of them actually suggest that they want to study but circumstances have forced them to be in this work. ‘Don’t you think this art will die, if you people also leave this work in the absent of fair compensation?’, I ask. ‘You see the problem is not the work but our financial capacity. Most of the work is actually not coming directly to these artisans. The middlemen in Kanpur and Delhi actually procure orders from the businessmen and then give it to us on a very low rate, says Shabnam. In the market, the stuff created by these artisans is appreciated and have large buyers but behind these beautiful creations are some bitter truth of negligence, exploitation and painful living conditions. Most of the people engaged in this work suffer from eye sight problems, migraine etc. Since this work does not fetch enough money to run even a single person’s life, young woman like Shabanam take to other work of Beedi making which add to their miseries further. As an instant rehabilitation, it might help them earn some money but make them vulnerable to other diseases like tuberculosis and skin diseases. The women chose beedi making due to various social stigmas attach to her particularly when she venture out. In such a society, it would be difficult for a working woman to survive if any day her name is attached to someone. Most of the time, women do not feel safe in going out and as they are illiterate hence it would not be possible for them to get even a safe job except domestic worker which too is very limited in the town. Asma, elder sister of Meena runs a scooter and cycles repair shop in the market. As I go along with Shabnam to speak to her, she does not feel comfortable in speaking to me. She earn about Rs 3000 per month which goes in running her house. ‘Many reporters came here and written about me and appreciated of my work but I am not comfortable doing this work’, she says and adds that ‘ It is not a worthwhile work for woman like me as people gaze at me and speak about me when I lie down to repair the scooter or fix the puncture. I am not doing this work at my own’. ‘ If I get an opportunity and some funds, I will leave this work and venture into cosmetic shop which is more ‘respectable’, she says. This shows the concerns, pain and fears of Muslim women who do something different yet feel deeply disturbed with the turn of events.
To run her living shabnam does zari-zardosi work and in the night from 9 pm till 1.30 she makes beedis so that she could earn some extra bucks to run her family. She works with a local nongovernmental organisation too but all this could not provide her a stable Rs 3,000 per month to run the family. It is tragic that such a hard working woman with great ideas has to suffer. The tension looks in her eyes. She is frustrated as nothing seems to be working at the moment. The art that we appreciate so much does not fetch her anything.
Today, there are one thousand such zardosi workers in Fatehpur town and most of them living in deeply difficult situation. Life is virtual hell for them as they seem to have no way forward. They are destined to live in such inhuman condition. For the beautiful art work that they do on the salwar-kameez which might be appreciated at Delhi market as superb, these people get a meagre amount. They are able to complete the work in 4 days on a Kurta and that too not alone as other also support them but the returns are very low. It is rather unfortunate and exploitative that for this much of work a girl earns nearly Rs 40-60 per piece which is completed in four days. In a month period, most of them do not even earn Rs 400-500/-. The men have better chances as they are paid more but still their earning too is less than Rs 3,000 /- a month if everything goes fine and the work is regular. Last year, I was informed, that a majority of them suffered under the Chinese invasion. Most of the new work was coming from China virtually making these artisans workless but today the situation seems to change as the customers have realised that the hand work is much better in quality than the mechanical one. And therefore, this year there was more work though it too is seasonal.
Shabanam want to unite the workers and start something for them. The frustration comes in hear heart and in her talks quite often. She is angry as nothing materialise here despite publication of articles and many people ‘photographing’ here. Newsmen come here and publish our stories in their newspapers but so far nothing has changed in their lives. The ‘developmental’ programmes have never reached pasmanda Muslims. They are virtually left out by the powerful leaders. None of these people have a BPL ration card even when most of them are living in abject poverty. Shabanam’s widowed mother has no pension, no other support. The family conditions forced Shabnam to apply for a job in the municipality but there too she was asked to pay Rs 70,000 as bribe for contract work which she was unable to pay.
Shabanam moves around in Burqa but very confident of her own self as she is able to earn something but the anguish of having an elder sister who is not married yet and an old mother who does not get anything, reflects in her eyes. There is no fixed salary for her and earning even Rs 3,000 is a rare thing in today’s time. She mocks at the government schemes of pretending to provide support to people. ‘Where is the support’, she ask? We are not even asking government to pay us, all we want is a fair deal in creating these beautiful stuff. We all know that in the international market these things are sold at a very high price but we are unable to get anything. We suffer while making other joyous.
While both men and women have faced tremendous pressure from the modern market here. She says, people appreciate art work and machine cannot really replace their art. But at the same point of time, people must pay for it. When I ask as why she has not been able to make a union of the people, she replies that now she is willing to work if people support the cause, she may take up. At the moment, she has her priorities to work for her family but definitely she does not want to sit silently and suffer. Most of the artisans cannot send their children to school as it is difficult to finish work on time and hence they engage their children too. There is no social security, health benefit and this art work actually affect their eye sight and beedi work makes them vulnerable to tuberculosis and breathing problems.
They are always indebted and the contractors use it. Women are not able to go out and remain under tremendous social pressure. This work is seasonal and hence artisans remain workless for many months. The contractors do not pay on time and for many months. Their own money is treated as advance and used as a tool of exploitation.
Shabanam’s eyes are asking various questions to me. But after hearing from many people she has this hope also that her voice and feeling will go to people who can think of saving this art. ‘Have you heard about Narega’, I ask. Yes, ‘ I know about it and they get Rs 100/- for their 8 hours work while we work to save this art and yet Rs 100 is a dream for us even in the three-four days. What an irony’, she says.
I have refused to accept defeat even in the darkest hour of life as these circumstances are created by our society and apathy. Democracy does not mean anything to them as it failed to protect them. They do not even know whether they have rights to get a dignified return for their work. Those who fight in their names have failed to benefits as most of these war cry’s actually created leaders and do not really resolve the issues of the people. Travelling different parts of India and speaking to various path breakers such as Shabanam is always a refreshing experience that people are still hopeful and have that ability to live their life in happiness and whatever they possess. They are exploring new ways despite the marginalisation created by the system in the past so many years. They are hope of the country even in these hours of gloom that so-called liberalisation has brought in their lives. I have seen in the eyes of Shabanam the hope for future and the courage, which is essential in these moments of crisis. One is sincerely hoping that there will be people who will be able to support such initiatives which can bring cheers in the lives of these people, our own Zardosi workers, who makes our brides beautiful, our boys look handsome and have kept our art alive despite all their pains and troubles.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Who am I to talk?
Syeda Hameed
Tags : syeda hameed, columnist indian express, indian express oped, Who am I to talk?
I feel it is only reasonable that I be expected to explain the rather unlikely subtitle of my piece. The fact is that the issue of Muslim concerns in contemporary India always reminds me of the first British census in India.
As a member of the Planning Commission, I strive to respond to the “developmental” concerns of certain segments of the population. “Muslims” form one such segment. However, to capture their concerns — let alone even begin to respond to them — is not an easy task. Who is the representative Muslim, I ask myself. Each seems as authentic as the next and yet they display such different concerns. In my immediate vicinity, there are Muslims whose primary concerns, at the moment, include: their daughter’s admission into a good nursery school; managing their work and personal lives, both of which veer off into unexpected directions; finishing a project, funding for which is running out; worrying about medical insurance; hoping that they will be “regularised” at work.
I realise, however, that authentic as these concerns are, they may not be “Muslim” concerns. “Muslim” concerns are those that emerge only/primarily because one is Muslim. They are not anchored in the fact of the Muslim’s many other identities: where she is also a parent, or a young person in a crisis of modernity, or a worker etc. This realisation brings to mind the first British census in India.
Early British administrators, earnest as they were, could not “govern” properly because they were unable to capture the concerns of the “native” population. Who were these people? How did they behave? How could one work toward their social-cultural uplift? The census of 1872 was an exercise in exactly such social management. It sought to “understand” the “native” demographics: this entailed counting but also “categorising” every person. The state assigned each person an identity, “Mohammedan”, for instance.
Earlier, before such categorisation of people into neat religious and caste brackets, communal identities must still have existed; individual and communitarian aspirations must still have been articulated. However, I believe that since these articulations/representations were not made before a newly bureaucratised state, they were perhaps allowed to be less deliberate, more transient. Perhaps, identities too were more “free-flowing”. Post-census — at least for the purposes of the state — a person’s aspirations were assessed mostly in terms of her primary identity.
Thus, to this day, Muslim representations to the state (and to the Planning Commission) are focused on generalities associated with the idea of being Muslim in India today. Sometimes, this results — counterintuitively — in Muslims declaring that they are second-class citizens in India. Unbelievable as this may sound, it is a logical corollary of the collapsing all other identities (of class, caste, gender and “historical privilege”), the overarching state categorisation of “Muslim”. In such circumstances, such declarations may appear to be fair assessments of one’s status.
One could argue that these are projected/ abstracted representations of being Muslim, for in actual life, the secondary identities that the state seems to ignore are much more real. On the other hand, there are perhaps several crucial issues where the delineations between general concerns of being Muslim (or Dalit, or a woman) and those that flow from having many other identities do collapse. One among them is finding an apartment to rent: it seems that in this endeavour, at least, class, caste, education and urbanity all collapse into the fact of being Muslim (or Dalit, or non-vegetarian, or South Indian).
“Formal” concerns of Muslims (or the representations before the state) focus mostly on the Sachar committee report and its non-implementation, on the status of the prime minister’s 15-point programme, on education (and scholarships) for Muslim children, on the hunger for education in the community, on livelihoods and issues of development and integration.
These efforts are supported by civil society and in the media by a host of committed organisations that monitor some of these programmes. There are several Muslim news portals (like twocircles.net) that report on the development/discrimination binary.
However, the broad categorisation of people into set identities is constantly being challenged. New sub-groups form and express concerns that are different from those of the larger community. This is a process of democratisation: thus, for example, the pasmanda has its own concerns, that of having been sidelined in the “developmental” processes of the larger Muslim community. The demand for inclusion of Muslim Dalits within the SC category consumes them at the moment. Similarly, Muslim women sometimes project differentiated claims (women-only mosques as articulated in Tamil Nadu, for example) as do class movements within Indian Muslims.
Outside of Muslim representations to the state, internally, other debates take place. Here, the idea of being “Muslim” is contested. The controversy around Vastanvi and his new plans for Deoband typifies this: what constitutes the Muslim self is a question that is being debated between the traditionalists and the reformists. I should state that these are both loose categories in the tradition of the colonial census but refer, in this case, to groups that want to retain the experiential way of learning, and to those that believe in bringing a scientific methodology to the study of Islam.
As part of the ummah, there is interest in the stirrings in the Arab world: the modernist sees it as an enlightened move toward democracy, vindicating their stand that Islam can indeed be secular and democratic and anti-fundamentalist. Others see in this a move away from Wahhabi towards newer forms of “moderate Islam”. Some also think it is a good thing.
The Muslim youth, like other young people, have also taken to social networking sites. When discussing Muslim issues they discuss Islam, Kashmir, the Zionist antecedents of Julian Assange and Mohamed ElBaradei’s links with the CIA. They also worry about “encounter deaths”, Batla House, terrorism and issues related to the security of Muslims. Incidentally, most are also very passionate about the market and the opportunities therein.
In conclusion, I wonder sometimes if I can only be a silent listener to Muslim concerns or whether I am authentic enough to represent them. Sometimes, we are told that being a mere observer in religious rituals, or being from a particular class, or from Delhi makes my experiences of being Muslim somewhat vicarious. I should not presume to represent. And then I think that while my experiences are admittedly different from other Muslim experiences, we cannot let any one set hegemonise all the others. There should be room for a plurality of concerns and worldviews even within the Muslims.
So let me see: yesterday I felt that Maulana Azad’s death anniversary was more or less neglected in the English media, reflected on the Godhra verdict, worried about unfinished work at the Commission, got annoyed because my friend’s flight from Canada was delayed and wondered why some people do not make enough of an effort with Urdu names. These were my concerns for the day, then.
The writer is a member of the Planning Commission
Syeda Hameed
Tags : syeda hameed, columnist indian express, indian express oped, Who am I to talk?
I feel it is only reasonable that I be expected to explain the rather unlikely subtitle of my piece. The fact is that the issue of Muslim concerns in contemporary India always reminds me of the first British census in India.
As a member of the Planning Commission, I strive to respond to the “developmental” concerns of certain segments of the population. “Muslims” form one such segment. However, to capture their concerns — let alone even begin to respond to them — is not an easy task. Who is the representative Muslim, I ask myself. Each seems as authentic as the next and yet they display such different concerns. In my immediate vicinity, there are Muslims whose primary concerns, at the moment, include: their daughter’s admission into a good nursery school; managing their work and personal lives, both of which veer off into unexpected directions; finishing a project, funding for which is running out; worrying about medical insurance; hoping that they will be “regularised” at work.
I realise, however, that authentic as these concerns are, they may not be “Muslim” concerns. “Muslim” concerns are those that emerge only/primarily because one is Muslim. They are not anchored in the fact of the Muslim’s many other identities: where she is also a parent, or a young person in a crisis of modernity, or a worker etc. This realisation brings to mind the first British census in India.
Early British administrators, earnest as they were, could not “govern” properly because they were unable to capture the concerns of the “native” population. Who were these people? How did they behave? How could one work toward their social-cultural uplift? The census of 1872 was an exercise in exactly such social management. It sought to “understand” the “native” demographics: this entailed counting but also “categorising” every person. The state assigned each person an identity, “Mohammedan”, for instance.
Earlier, before such categorisation of people into neat religious and caste brackets, communal identities must still have existed; individual and communitarian aspirations must still have been articulated. However, I believe that since these articulations/representations were not made before a newly bureaucratised state, they were perhaps allowed to be less deliberate, more transient. Perhaps, identities too were more “free-flowing”. Post-census — at least for the purposes of the state — a person’s aspirations were assessed mostly in terms of her primary identity.
Thus, to this day, Muslim representations to the state (and to the Planning Commission) are focused on generalities associated with the idea of being Muslim in India today. Sometimes, this results — counterintuitively — in Muslims declaring that they are second-class citizens in India. Unbelievable as this may sound, it is a logical corollary of the collapsing all other identities (of class, caste, gender and “historical privilege”), the overarching state categorisation of “Muslim”. In such circumstances, such declarations may appear to be fair assessments of one’s status.
One could argue that these are projected/ abstracted representations of being Muslim, for in actual life, the secondary identities that the state seems to ignore are much more real. On the other hand, there are perhaps several crucial issues where the delineations between general concerns of being Muslim (or Dalit, or a woman) and those that flow from having many other identities do collapse. One among them is finding an apartment to rent: it seems that in this endeavour, at least, class, caste, education and urbanity all collapse into the fact of being Muslim (or Dalit, or non-vegetarian, or South Indian).
“Formal” concerns of Muslims (or the representations before the state) focus mostly on the Sachar committee report and its non-implementation, on the status of the prime minister’s 15-point programme, on education (and scholarships) for Muslim children, on the hunger for education in the community, on livelihoods and issues of development and integration.
These efforts are supported by civil society and in the media by a host of committed organisations that monitor some of these programmes. There are several Muslim news portals (like twocircles.net) that report on the development/discrimination binary.
However, the broad categorisation of people into set identities is constantly being challenged. New sub-groups form and express concerns that are different from those of the larger community. This is a process of democratisation: thus, for example, the pasmanda has its own concerns, that of having been sidelined in the “developmental” processes of the larger Muslim community. The demand for inclusion of Muslim Dalits within the SC category consumes them at the moment. Similarly, Muslim women sometimes project differentiated claims (women-only mosques as articulated in Tamil Nadu, for example) as do class movements within Indian Muslims.
Outside of Muslim representations to the state, internally, other debates take place. Here, the idea of being “Muslim” is contested. The controversy around Vastanvi and his new plans for Deoband typifies this: what constitutes the Muslim self is a question that is being debated between the traditionalists and the reformists. I should state that these are both loose categories in the tradition of the colonial census but refer, in this case, to groups that want to retain the experiential way of learning, and to those that believe in bringing a scientific methodology to the study of Islam.
As part of the ummah, there is interest in the stirrings in the Arab world: the modernist sees it as an enlightened move toward democracy, vindicating their stand that Islam can indeed be secular and democratic and anti-fundamentalist. Others see in this a move away from Wahhabi towards newer forms of “moderate Islam”. Some also think it is a good thing.
The Muslim youth, like other young people, have also taken to social networking sites. When discussing Muslim issues they discuss Islam, Kashmir, the Zionist antecedents of Julian Assange and Mohamed ElBaradei’s links with the CIA. They also worry about “encounter deaths”, Batla House, terrorism and issues related to the security of Muslims. Incidentally, most are also very passionate about the market and the opportunities therein.
In conclusion, I wonder sometimes if I can only be a silent listener to Muslim concerns or whether I am authentic enough to represent them. Sometimes, we are told that being a mere observer in religious rituals, or being from a particular class, or from Delhi makes my experiences of being Muslim somewhat vicarious. I should not presume to represent. And then I think that while my experiences are admittedly different from other Muslim experiences, we cannot let any one set hegemonise all the others. There should be room for a plurality of concerns and worldviews even within the Muslims.
So let me see: yesterday I felt that Maulana Azad’s death anniversary was more or less neglected in the English media, reflected on the Godhra verdict, worried about unfinished work at the Commission, got annoyed because my friend’s flight from Canada was delayed and wondered why some people do not make enough of an effort with Urdu names. These were my concerns for the day, then.
The writer is a member of the Planning Commission
Irony of Gujarat.
The Muslim as BJP supporter in Gujarat
RAHEEL DHATTIWALA
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The Hindu Gujarat Chief Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party leader Narendra Modi greeted by party's Muslim workers during an election meeting. File photo
In a patronage democracy where resource distribution depends on the discretion of elected officials, it pays to stay close to the power centres in government.
Ahmadbhai Shaikh is a muezzin in a mosque in the Behrampura area of Ahmedabad. If not reciting the ‘azaan,' he is busy helping Bharatiya Janata Party workers in his ward to campaign among members of his community. His reason for shifting from the Congress to the BJP is “the hope that our drainage problems will be solved, after all these years.” As one who was lucky to escape the arson and looting in the city in 2002, he merely calls that a “period of misfortune.”
It was nine years ago that Gujarat's biggest wave of Hindu-Muslim violence was triggered in Godhra. The burning of the Sabarmati Express marked the beginning of an anti-Muslim backlash that continued intermittently for the entire year amid allegations of State complicity. That period reinforced existing residential and symbolic segregation of Muslims in cities like Ahmedabad.
Nine years later, the victims of the violence are embracing their perceived perpetrators.
As has been already discussed extensively, Gujarat's Muslims voting for the BJP is an exceptional case compared to, say, Bihar where the BJP was accepted only on the condition of excluding Hindutva (and Narendra Modi), or even other parts of northern India where Sikhs voted for their perceived oppressors, the Congress, only after a public apology the party made to the community. The reasons for the transformation behind the new ‘all-inclusive' BJP have also been discussed widely.
Yet, what is far more exceptional is the kind of Muslims supporting the BJP in Gujarat.
Take Ahmedabad city, for example. The campaign trail of the BJP in the 2010 civic polls here included a patchwork of busybody Muslim clerics and traders: two groups that we would assume to have different voting preferences. The traders have an understandable, rational logic of voting for a party that has emphasised its economic development policies as never before. The voting preference of two significant trader-Muslim communities of Gujarat, the Dawoodi Bohras and the Khojas — both Shias — has always tended to be biased towards the party in power, be it the British in pre-independent India, the Congress in the 1980s to early-1990s, or the BJP later. “The Syedna or the head priest will always seek a cordial relationship with those in power. It is in his interests, and as he sees it, in the interests of the community,” says scholar-activist J.S. Bandukwala.
However, if one looks at the situation five years ago, it is fascinating and almost implausible why religious Sunni Muslims, including clerics, would come out to support the BJP.
In 2006, this writer spoke with Asma Saiyed, a student at St. Xavier's College in Ahmedabad. Enraged by the events of 2002, she had taken a significant decision: to add the burqa to her wardrobe of western wear. For this eloquent young woman, wearing her religion on her sleeve was a “slap in the face” of the BJP, which she viewed as the architect of violence against Muslims in 2002. “All of us friends felt cowed down by a constant anti-Muslim rhetoric since 2002. And we thought whether it made any sense to be scared. We said, okay so you want to hate us? Here are our burqas so we know that you know we are Muslims. Now come, get us.”
Ms Saiyed belonged to that section of Muslims who developed a collective identity in opposition to the majority, most of whom, they believed, endorsed the BJP's Hindutva rhetoric. This was similar to what John Ogbu's work on ‘oppositional culture' among Black American students in the U.S. tells us — that their identities as minorities were developed as a response to White racism, which then led them to oppose conformism in education and all that which would be “good” (White or majority) behaviour.
Religious symbolism became a shield for these Muslims to protect their identities against the threat of rising, rabid Hindutva. Compromise seemed impossible even in the exchange of economic development. So when Congress workers told this writer recently that Muslims were paid by the BJP to support it in the civic elections, it was paradoxical, even if the claim were true. People generally refuse to involve themselves in cost-benefit calculations and reach a self-serving decision on issues of a sacred nature when given material incentives in exchange. Assuming some Muslims did accept money from the BJP in exchange of support, does it mean they are no longer looking at the 2002 post-Godhra violence as an attack on their religious identity? If the Congress is not a favourable alternative and the BJP a lurking ethnic threat, why vote at all?
The answer perhaps lies in the fact that India's is a patronage democracy wherein resource distribution depends on the discretion of elected officials as a form of market good rather than an entitlement. Staying close to the power centres in government is the key to survival. For the traders, survival is synonymous with their occupation. For the cleric, it could mean assimilation to avoid being labelled anything from anti-social to anti-national — no surprise that most Muslim BJP supporters, including religious Muslims, have patriotic songs as their phone caller tune.
“This terrorism taint is too much for the community. As long as the BJP is in power, we have to be part of the mainstream to shun this tag,” says Imranbhai, a fruit vendor in Ahmedabad. He fits the stereotype of the Congress supporter: white kurta-pyjama, skull cap, untrimmed beard and moustache. Only that he swears by the BJP. “There is no shame for a Muslim today to admit he supports the BJP,” he says. Indeed, the indifference of religious Muslims to saffron flags fluttering in the dense Muslim ghettos of Juhapura and Saudagar ni Pol in Ahmedabad — areas that are alien to the local Hindu except in scary stories — was unthinkable earlier.
Moin Khan, once a CPI(M) worker, soon to sign up with the BJP, explains that the power centre for a religious Muslim is the local cleric; for the cleric, it is the people in governance. “The maulvis can mobilise masses because people listen to them. For the maulvis to establish credibility among the people, they have no choice but to get their hands dirtied in their network of influential politicians.” He recalls how a Sunni Muslim cleric who was close to the BJP helped trace a local slum-dweller's daughter who had disappeared. “Some clerics help the Congress, many now [help] the BJP because there is no alternative.”
Moving back again five years ago, as one section of Muslims in Ahmedabad battled issues of identity using religion as a shield, another section had begun to develop a different kind of collective solutions to the discrimination. They were of the view that survival was possible only for the fittest Muslim — one who conforms to the mainstream majority. Prepping up for an existence war of sorts, they began to set up schools and focus on mainstream education for their children. Almost 70 per cent of Muslim-managed educational institutions, for example, were established in Ahmedabad between 1993 and 2005 — after the two waves of Hindu-Muslim violence.
Qutbuddin Ansari, who became the “face of the Gujarat riots,” his pleading picture making news in national and international media in 2002, refused an interview with this writer in 2007. His request: privacy. “I've moved on. Please let me be.”
The movement to “move on” had already started. The recent civic elections took it to a higher level.
Remember that this remains a discussion about a very small section of Muslims — most of whom relatively (that is, not directly) affected by the violence. Moreover, political attitudes in a civic election are based on ground issues. Slum-dwellers in the old city of Ahmedabad are ready to switch left, right and centre (the CPI (M) to the RSS to the BJP) as long as they get their local corporator to provide their daily quota of drinking water. Whether the BJP will continue to embrace Muslims at the cost of upsetting its majority target voters in Gujarat in the Assembly elections, will be seen in the future.
“The BJP will always be anti-Muslim, that is its identity. But the benefits it has given to Hindus, say in the Sarkhej ward, have indirectly reached Muslims,” says Shahid Ali, a Muslim entrepreneur. A Congress supporter, he is open to the BJP if it continues to welcome Muslim candidates. Speaking of former top cop Al Saiyed, who contested on the BJP ticket, he says, “I would not mind having a Muslim candidate like Saiyed. At least I have someone of my own to hold accountable for any sloppy work.” Mr. Saiyed, who managed to get over 13,000 votes in Sarkhej, himself believes that the recent change in political behaviour is driven by educated Muslims and those who have realised the need to be in the mainstream. “If we do not assimilate with other communities, it's the end of us!” he says.
The Hindu, Feb 24th, 2011
(Raheel Dhattiwala is a doctoral researcher in the Department of Sociology, University of Oxford, who is doing field work in Ahmedabad.)
RAHEEL DHATTIWALA
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The Hindu Gujarat Chief Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party leader Narendra Modi greeted by party's Muslim workers during an election meeting. File photo
In a patronage democracy where resource distribution depends on the discretion of elected officials, it pays to stay close to the power centres in government.
Ahmadbhai Shaikh is a muezzin in a mosque in the Behrampura area of Ahmedabad. If not reciting the ‘azaan,' he is busy helping Bharatiya Janata Party workers in his ward to campaign among members of his community. His reason for shifting from the Congress to the BJP is “the hope that our drainage problems will be solved, after all these years.” As one who was lucky to escape the arson and looting in the city in 2002, he merely calls that a “period of misfortune.”
It was nine years ago that Gujarat's biggest wave of Hindu-Muslim violence was triggered in Godhra. The burning of the Sabarmati Express marked the beginning of an anti-Muslim backlash that continued intermittently for the entire year amid allegations of State complicity. That period reinforced existing residential and symbolic segregation of Muslims in cities like Ahmedabad.
Nine years later, the victims of the violence are embracing their perceived perpetrators.
As has been already discussed extensively, Gujarat's Muslims voting for the BJP is an exceptional case compared to, say, Bihar where the BJP was accepted only on the condition of excluding Hindutva (and Narendra Modi), or even other parts of northern India where Sikhs voted for their perceived oppressors, the Congress, only after a public apology the party made to the community. The reasons for the transformation behind the new ‘all-inclusive' BJP have also been discussed widely.
Yet, what is far more exceptional is the kind of Muslims supporting the BJP in Gujarat.
Take Ahmedabad city, for example. The campaign trail of the BJP in the 2010 civic polls here included a patchwork of busybody Muslim clerics and traders: two groups that we would assume to have different voting preferences. The traders have an understandable, rational logic of voting for a party that has emphasised its economic development policies as never before. The voting preference of two significant trader-Muslim communities of Gujarat, the Dawoodi Bohras and the Khojas — both Shias — has always tended to be biased towards the party in power, be it the British in pre-independent India, the Congress in the 1980s to early-1990s, or the BJP later. “The Syedna or the head priest will always seek a cordial relationship with those in power. It is in his interests, and as he sees it, in the interests of the community,” says scholar-activist J.S. Bandukwala.
However, if one looks at the situation five years ago, it is fascinating and almost implausible why religious Sunni Muslims, including clerics, would come out to support the BJP.
In 2006, this writer spoke with Asma Saiyed, a student at St. Xavier's College in Ahmedabad. Enraged by the events of 2002, she had taken a significant decision: to add the burqa to her wardrobe of western wear. For this eloquent young woman, wearing her religion on her sleeve was a “slap in the face” of the BJP, which she viewed as the architect of violence against Muslims in 2002. “All of us friends felt cowed down by a constant anti-Muslim rhetoric since 2002. And we thought whether it made any sense to be scared. We said, okay so you want to hate us? Here are our burqas so we know that you know we are Muslims. Now come, get us.”
Ms Saiyed belonged to that section of Muslims who developed a collective identity in opposition to the majority, most of whom, they believed, endorsed the BJP's Hindutva rhetoric. This was similar to what John Ogbu's work on ‘oppositional culture' among Black American students in the U.S. tells us — that their identities as minorities were developed as a response to White racism, which then led them to oppose conformism in education and all that which would be “good” (White or majority) behaviour.
Religious symbolism became a shield for these Muslims to protect their identities against the threat of rising, rabid Hindutva. Compromise seemed impossible even in the exchange of economic development. So when Congress workers told this writer recently that Muslims were paid by the BJP to support it in the civic elections, it was paradoxical, even if the claim were true. People generally refuse to involve themselves in cost-benefit calculations and reach a self-serving decision on issues of a sacred nature when given material incentives in exchange. Assuming some Muslims did accept money from the BJP in exchange of support, does it mean they are no longer looking at the 2002 post-Godhra violence as an attack on their religious identity? If the Congress is not a favourable alternative and the BJP a lurking ethnic threat, why vote at all?
The answer perhaps lies in the fact that India's is a patronage democracy wherein resource distribution depends on the discretion of elected officials as a form of market good rather than an entitlement. Staying close to the power centres in government is the key to survival. For the traders, survival is synonymous with their occupation. For the cleric, it could mean assimilation to avoid being labelled anything from anti-social to anti-national — no surprise that most Muslim BJP supporters, including religious Muslims, have patriotic songs as their phone caller tune.
“This terrorism taint is too much for the community. As long as the BJP is in power, we have to be part of the mainstream to shun this tag,” says Imranbhai, a fruit vendor in Ahmedabad. He fits the stereotype of the Congress supporter: white kurta-pyjama, skull cap, untrimmed beard and moustache. Only that he swears by the BJP. “There is no shame for a Muslim today to admit he supports the BJP,” he says. Indeed, the indifference of religious Muslims to saffron flags fluttering in the dense Muslim ghettos of Juhapura and Saudagar ni Pol in Ahmedabad — areas that are alien to the local Hindu except in scary stories — was unthinkable earlier.
Moin Khan, once a CPI(M) worker, soon to sign up with the BJP, explains that the power centre for a religious Muslim is the local cleric; for the cleric, it is the people in governance. “The maulvis can mobilise masses because people listen to them. For the maulvis to establish credibility among the people, they have no choice but to get their hands dirtied in their network of influential politicians.” He recalls how a Sunni Muslim cleric who was close to the BJP helped trace a local slum-dweller's daughter who had disappeared. “Some clerics help the Congress, many now [help] the BJP because there is no alternative.”
Moving back again five years ago, as one section of Muslims in Ahmedabad battled issues of identity using religion as a shield, another section had begun to develop a different kind of collective solutions to the discrimination. They were of the view that survival was possible only for the fittest Muslim — one who conforms to the mainstream majority. Prepping up for an existence war of sorts, they began to set up schools and focus on mainstream education for their children. Almost 70 per cent of Muslim-managed educational institutions, for example, were established in Ahmedabad between 1993 and 2005 — after the two waves of Hindu-Muslim violence.
Qutbuddin Ansari, who became the “face of the Gujarat riots,” his pleading picture making news in national and international media in 2002, refused an interview with this writer in 2007. His request: privacy. “I've moved on. Please let me be.”
The movement to “move on” had already started. The recent civic elections took it to a higher level.
Remember that this remains a discussion about a very small section of Muslims — most of whom relatively (that is, not directly) affected by the violence. Moreover, political attitudes in a civic election are based on ground issues. Slum-dwellers in the old city of Ahmedabad are ready to switch left, right and centre (the CPI (M) to the RSS to the BJP) as long as they get their local corporator to provide their daily quota of drinking water. Whether the BJP will continue to embrace Muslims at the cost of upsetting its majority target voters in Gujarat in the Assembly elections, will be seen in the future.
“The BJP will always be anti-Muslim, that is its identity. But the benefits it has given to Hindus, say in the Sarkhej ward, have indirectly reached Muslims,” says Shahid Ali, a Muslim entrepreneur. A Congress supporter, he is open to the BJP if it continues to welcome Muslim candidates. Speaking of former top cop Al Saiyed, who contested on the BJP ticket, he says, “I would not mind having a Muslim candidate like Saiyed. At least I have someone of my own to hold accountable for any sloppy work.” Mr. Saiyed, who managed to get over 13,000 votes in Sarkhej, himself believes that the recent change in political behaviour is driven by educated Muslims and those who have realised the need to be in the mainstream. “If we do not assimilate with other communities, it's the end of us!” he says.
The Hindu, Feb 24th, 2011
(Raheel Dhattiwala is a doctoral researcher in the Department of Sociology, University of Oxford, who is doing field work in Ahmedabad.)
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Vastanvi is the rightful heir of the Deobandi tradition
Tanweer Alam | New Delhi, February 23, 2011 | Updated 08:12 IST
UTILITIES
Darul Uloom Deoband, the leading Islamic seminary of the subcontinent, is in turmoil today. At the heart of the struggle is the issue of who comes to finally control it. The chances are that Maulana Ghulam Mohammad Vastanvi, who has been its rector for a short while, could be forced to make way for someone supported by the powerful Madni clan. Though Vastanvi, a Gujarati, is a relative of the Madnis ( who are from Faizabad near Ayodhya in UP), he is seen as an outsider.
History
The move to oust Vastanvi arose from a stray remark of his which was construed to mean that Muslims have been flourishing in Modi's Gujarat. If he is really forced to quit, it would be against the very spirit of Deoband, which has traditionally chosen to de-emphasise Hindu-Muslim distinctions and communal antagonisms. Its unwritten policy has been not to dwell too long upon the episodes of communal conflict and consistently emphasise the shared ground between Hindus, Muslims and communities of every other faith. This legacy, by the way, could go a long way in saving him at the crucial hour.
When the time came to choose between the Hindu Gandhi and Nehru, and the Muslim Jinnah and Liaqat Ali, Deoband clearly and unequivocally chose the former. When a fierce debate was raging on Indian nationalism versus "Islamic nationalism", Deoband's stalwarts publicly declared that Islam was a faith, not a nation.
When Deoband firmly rejected Pakistan, the towering scholar and freedom fighter from this seat of learning Maulana Hussain Ahmad Madni came forward to explain to Muslims why. He said wataniyat (nationalism) came from watan (motherland), not from deen (religious faith). Deen could not be made the basis of nationalism. For that, the poet Iqbal lampooned him in his poetry.
Let us link Maulana Vastanvi's remarks to that old Deobandi tradition of putting watan first and ignoring the differences between the ahle-watan (people of motherland). Let us not look at what he said as an attempt to take away the heat from Modi. Generosity of spirit shown by a victim does not necessarily lead to the exoneration of the aggressor, and Maulana Vastanvi's remarks may not be enough for the law to salvage Modi.
A look at the past would be illustrative. Most Indians believe that Mahatma Gandhi would never have wanted any harm to come to his killer Nathuram Godse. Yet, Godse was awarded the death sentence. When the Turk Mehmet Ali Agca shot at and critically wounded Pope John Paul II, the large-hearted Pope forgave him and went to see him in jail. Agca, who had no rhyme or reason to do what he did (and thus could be mentally unstable), got a long jail sentence. The wife of Father Graham Staines has forgiven Dara Singh for the brutal murder of her husband and two sons, yet that did not prevent the Orissa High Court from awarding him a life term.
Sonia Gandhi and her children have forgiven Rajiv's killers, yet they languish behind bars.
It is interesting to note that the founder of Darul Uloom, Maulana Qasim Nanautavi, believed in, and preached a noncompetitive relationship with Hindus, a relationship that emphasised the shared ground rather than the religious distinctions.
The first generation of his disciples like Maulana Obaidullah Sindhi continued the struggle against the British Raj. Maulana Nanautavi himself was among the resistance fighters of 1857. However, when his disciples declared a " Government of India in Exile" in Pashtun territory, the president was not a Muslim, but a Hindu, Raja Mahendra Pratap. That tradition has survived in Deoband.
Secular
So has the staunch disavowal of confusing Islam with nationalism. Nation and faith, to these people, are two different categories. Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, who did not come from Deoband, but had remarkable identity of ideas with these people, predicted in 1947 that Pakistan would break under the weight of its own contradictions. Maulana Madni said at that time East and West Pakistan would separate within 25 years.
Their argument was that ethnic identities could not be wished away at the spur of the moment. The Deoband ulema warned Indian Muslims that there was more in common between Hindus and Muslims of Bihar or UP than between Muslims of these states and Muslims of Balochistan, Punjab and the Frontier. " You are afraid of Hindu nationalism, but you will find Baloch and Pashtun nationalism more difficult to deal with", they reasoned.
In Islam, the heirs of prophets are not necessarily their sons and grandsons, but those who carry the tradition faithfully. We know well who the real heir of Deoband's stalwarts is and their legacy of healing the wounds of fratricidal conflicts.
Is it a sacrilege to try to get Gujarat to cool down and allow the fratricidal rage brewing in people's hearts to cool off? Does the holy Quran not say that people who have been wronged have the moral right to avenge it, but Allah loves those who would rather not take revenge and forgive, for Allah is forgiving? Let's be clear. No society can afford to be perpetually at war with itself. This holds good for Gujarati society as well. For a while it looked and felt good for the Hindu right to announce that the " Gujarat lab experiment" was highly successful. But it does not work that way in life. Still, Islam and Mussalmans are there, like there are influential Jews in today's Germany despite Hitler and the Holocaust. Gujarat and its Muslims have got to move on, as everybody else does.
That is all Maulana Vastanvi suggested. He knows that whosoever was behind the 2002 bloodbath will have to deal with the law of the land, irrespective of what the maulanas or anyone else says.
The law will do what it is supposed to be doing, while the society will try to heal itself through reconciliation at different levels.
Nobody forefeits his/ her right to make a conciliatory gesture merely by becoming the head of an organisation. The claim that as Deoband V- C Maulana Vastanvi cannot talk of love and reconciliation is absurd. There is no copyright on love.
When Syed Shahabuddin and Maulana Ali Mian Nadwi visited the Kanchi Shankaracharya at his mutt , the seer treated them like brothers. Among the many gestures of kindness made by him was the provision of a quiet space for the visiting Muslims at the mutt to offer namaz . This is how a religious leader acts.
Example
Another example of transdenominational religiosity in our times was Guru Virsa Singh ji of Govind Sadan on the outskirts of Delhi. This Sikh guru was equally accessible to and trusted by Sikhs, Hindus, Christians and Muslims. He had an international following and most of the white men and women at the ashram were from Christian and Jewish backgrounds.
Baba Virsa Singh ji 's ashram was thronged by a large number of Muslims on Muslim festival days. Similarly, people of other faiths used to gather on days of religious festivals. The Baba, who passed away in 2001, used to preach the love of God as described in different scriptures.
He was particularly close to the Muslim sufi tradition. Baba Farid, a Muslim sufi, is part of the Sikh lore. Nobody has an exclusive right on air, water, sun and the earth. Mother Teresa is not patented by Christians. There is no patent on love. Maulana Vastanvi belongs to all of us, and is the right heir to the stalwarts of Deoband who believed that Hindus and Muslims were the children of the same earth. Let Maulana Vastanvi be.
The author is a Delhi-based social activist
Tanweer Alam | New Delhi, February 23, 2011 | Updated 08:12 IST
UTILITIES
Darul Uloom Deoband, the leading Islamic seminary of the subcontinent, is in turmoil today. At the heart of the struggle is the issue of who comes to finally control it. The chances are that Maulana Ghulam Mohammad Vastanvi, who has been its rector for a short while, could be forced to make way for someone supported by the powerful Madni clan. Though Vastanvi, a Gujarati, is a relative of the Madnis ( who are from Faizabad near Ayodhya in UP), he is seen as an outsider.
History
The move to oust Vastanvi arose from a stray remark of his which was construed to mean that Muslims have been flourishing in Modi's Gujarat. If he is really forced to quit, it would be against the very spirit of Deoband, which has traditionally chosen to de-emphasise Hindu-Muslim distinctions and communal antagonisms. Its unwritten policy has been not to dwell too long upon the episodes of communal conflict and consistently emphasise the shared ground between Hindus, Muslims and communities of every other faith. This legacy, by the way, could go a long way in saving him at the crucial hour.
When the time came to choose between the Hindu Gandhi and Nehru, and the Muslim Jinnah and Liaqat Ali, Deoband clearly and unequivocally chose the former. When a fierce debate was raging on Indian nationalism versus "Islamic nationalism", Deoband's stalwarts publicly declared that Islam was a faith, not a nation.
When Deoband firmly rejected Pakistan, the towering scholar and freedom fighter from this seat of learning Maulana Hussain Ahmad Madni came forward to explain to Muslims why. He said wataniyat (nationalism) came from watan (motherland), not from deen (religious faith). Deen could not be made the basis of nationalism. For that, the poet Iqbal lampooned him in his poetry.
Let us link Maulana Vastanvi's remarks to that old Deobandi tradition of putting watan first and ignoring the differences between the ahle-watan (people of motherland). Let us not look at what he said as an attempt to take away the heat from Modi. Generosity of spirit shown by a victim does not necessarily lead to the exoneration of the aggressor, and Maulana Vastanvi's remarks may not be enough for the law to salvage Modi.
A look at the past would be illustrative. Most Indians believe that Mahatma Gandhi would never have wanted any harm to come to his killer Nathuram Godse. Yet, Godse was awarded the death sentence. When the Turk Mehmet Ali Agca shot at and critically wounded Pope John Paul II, the large-hearted Pope forgave him and went to see him in jail. Agca, who had no rhyme or reason to do what he did (and thus could be mentally unstable), got a long jail sentence. The wife of Father Graham Staines has forgiven Dara Singh for the brutal murder of her husband and two sons, yet that did not prevent the Orissa High Court from awarding him a life term.
Sonia Gandhi and her children have forgiven Rajiv's killers, yet they languish behind bars.
It is interesting to note that the founder of Darul Uloom, Maulana Qasim Nanautavi, believed in, and preached a noncompetitive relationship with Hindus, a relationship that emphasised the shared ground rather than the religious distinctions.
The first generation of his disciples like Maulana Obaidullah Sindhi continued the struggle against the British Raj. Maulana Nanautavi himself was among the resistance fighters of 1857. However, when his disciples declared a " Government of India in Exile" in Pashtun territory, the president was not a Muslim, but a Hindu, Raja Mahendra Pratap. That tradition has survived in Deoband.
Secular
So has the staunch disavowal of confusing Islam with nationalism. Nation and faith, to these people, are two different categories. Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, who did not come from Deoband, but had remarkable identity of ideas with these people, predicted in 1947 that Pakistan would break under the weight of its own contradictions. Maulana Madni said at that time East and West Pakistan would separate within 25 years.
Their argument was that ethnic identities could not be wished away at the spur of the moment. The Deoband ulema warned Indian Muslims that there was more in common between Hindus and Muslims of Bihar or UP than between Muslims of these states and Muslims of Balochistan, Punjab and the Frontier. " You are afraid of Hindu nationalism, but you will find Baloch and Pashtun nationalism more difficult to deal with", they reasoned.
In Islam, the heirs of prophets are not necessarily their sons and grandsons, but those who carry the tradition faithfully. We know well who the real heir of Deoband's stalwarts is and their legacy of healing the wounds of fratricidal conflicts.
Is it a sacrilege to try to get Gujarat to cool down and allow the fratricidal rage brewing in people's hearts to cool off? Does the holy Quran not say that people who have been wronged have the moral right to avenge it, but Allah loves those who would rather not take revenge and forgive, for Allah is forgiving? Let's be clear. No society can afford to be perpetually at war with itself. This holds good for Gujarati society as well. For a while it looked and felt good for the Hindu right to announce that the " Gujarat lab experiment" was highly successful. But it does not work that way in life. Still, Islam and Mussalmans are there, like there are influential Jews in today's Germany despite Hitler and the Holocaust. Gujarat and its Muslims have got to move on, as everybody else does.
That is all Maulana Vastanvi suggested. He knows that whosoever was behind the 2002 bloodbath will have to deal with the law of the land, irrespective of what the maulanas or anyone else says.
The law will do what it is supposed to be doing, while the society will try to heal itself through reconciliation at different levels.
Nobody forefeits his/ her right to make a conciliatory gesture merely by becoming the head of an organisation. The claim that as Deoband V- C Maulana Vastanvi cannot talk of love and reconciliation is absurd. There is no copyright on love.
When Syed Shahabuddin and Maulana Ali Mian Nadwi visited the Kanchi Shankaracharya at his mutt , the seer treated them like brothers. Among the many gestures of kindness made by him was the provision of a quiet space for the visiting Muslims at the mutt to offer namaz . This is how a religious leader acts.
Example
Another example of transdenominational religiosity in our times was Guru Virsa Singh ji of Govind Sadan on the outskirts of Delhi. This Sikh guru was equally accessible to and trusted by Sikhs, Hindus, Christians and Muslims. He had an international following and most of the white men and women at the ashram were from Christian and Jewish backgrounds.
Baba Virsa Singh ji 's ashram was thronged by a large number of Muslims on Muslim festival days. Similarly, people of other faiths used to gather on days of religious festivals. The Baba, who passed away in 2001, used to preach the love of God as described in different scriptures.
He was particularly close to the Muslim sufi tradition. Baba Farid, a Muslim sufi, is part of the Sikh lore. Nobody has an exclusive right on air, water, sun and the earth. Mother Teresa is not patented by Christians. There is no patent on love. Maulana Vastanvi belongs to all of us, and is the right heir to the stalwarts of Deoband who believed that Hindus and Muslims were the children of the same earth. Let Maulana Vastanvi be.
The author is a Delhi-based social activist
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