Published as theme article 'Sadbhav Mission, Fostering Harmony and Thwarting Communal Hatred" in Fr. Agnelo's Call in October 2020
Going
by the alarming rise in communal hatred in this country and the majoritarian
tolerance to this social and political scourge, it perhaps may not be out of
place to assume, that caste discrimination and communal hatred are among the
chief causes for poverty and a hindrance to progress. If these evils had
qualified for the Geographical Indication tag, then India’s brand of communal
hatred may have qualified for it. Viewing communal hatred as a legacy of
colonial rule is nothing but denial by Indians in accepting the bitter truth.
We should not forget that the scourge of widespread untouchability and
Hindu-Muslim hatred were the most pressing irritants and hurdles in fostering unity
during the Indian freedom struggle.
Mahatma
Gandhi’s writings are splashed with admonishments of various communal incidents,
along with his expression of pain and anguish over this inhuman streak, in
fellow Indians. He tirelessly struggled to eradicate this virus of hate in
Indian society, till he was silenced by the bullets of a Hindu fanatic. It was
Gandhiji’s refusal to subscribe to the Hindu Mahasabha’s agenda, that invited
the hate of fanatic Hindus. Gandhiji had said, “My longing is to be able to
cement the two [Hindus and Muslims] with my blood, if necessary.” (Young India, 25-9-1924, p.314) Communal
hatred has been so entrenched in society, that even the joy of India’s
independence was overshadowed by the horror of a partition of this nation; on
communal lines.
Even
seventy years after Gandhiji’s assassination, the ‘merchants of hate’ refuse to
allow unity and peace to flourish in India. According to some historians, there
have been a roughly-estimated 33,000 Hindu-Muslim riots since 1947, which have
largely been concentrated in just four of the twenty-eight Indian States. The
fact that a section of the Muslim community has responded with violence on
being provoked has only given cause for the entire community to be tagged as
intolerant. However, the fairly peaceful 2.3% Christians in the country has
also not been spared the wrath of communal hatred. Though there has been an
effort in some quarters to delink Hinduism from the hate spewed by certain organisations,
the bitter reality is that Islamophobia and the narrative of forceful
conversions by Christian missionaries is being used to rationalise communal
hatred against the minorities.
Besides
the stray targeting of Christian religious places and symbols of worship by fanatics
since independence, the worst attack against Christians has occurred in the
Dang district of Gujarat in 1998 and thereafter in Kandhamal district of Orissa
in 2008. According to the Ministry of Home Affairs’ reply to a RTI query, there
have been 10,399 incidents of communal violence from 2014 to 2017 with 1,605
people killed and 30,723 injured. With a Government that has a history of
politically exploiting incidents of violence against minorities, these figures
could be much higher considering the reluctance of police stations to register
FIRs, or playing down the pre-planned communal riots as being any other law-and-order
problem, arising from suspicion or misunderstandings.
Contextualising communal hate in India
To
tackle communal hate in this country, a sound psychological and political
understanding of the problem is a must. According to a former IPS officer, N.C
Asthana, “scientific literature divides hatred into seven types, namely –
accepted; hot; cold; burning; simmering; furious; and all-embracing. In the
current Indian context, however, burning hatred is the most relevant – which
entails hatred towards a group. They are seen as sub-human or inhuman and
threatening, and something must be done to reduce the ‘threat’ they pose.” He
further goes on to state that, “All those who spew hatred, including jingoists
and the hyper-nationalists, are often under-achievers in life. This leads to a
deep-rooted inferiority complex and frustration. They must blame something for
it, which also becomes an object of resentment and later, hatred. However, in
an effort to salvage some of their sagging self-esteem, they try to compensate
for it by latching on to something, which, in their perception, is visibly,
tangibly an ‘achiever’ – such as a political party or some well-known
organisation. By associating themselves with that organisation, they feel that
the prestige, recognition or glory of the organisation will ‘rub off’ onto them
and compensate for what they could not achieve individually.” (source: The Wire, ‘Understanding The
Psychology of Hatred’, March 2, 2020)
Communal hate is about majoritarian supremacy
Communal
hatred in this country has become a fight of majoritarian supremacism against inclusive
democracy, which is yet to be understood by many Indians. According to several
social scientists, nationalism is the vehicle used by the upper castes, to
regain the traditional oppressive political and economic control over society,
which has been neutralised in the Indian Constitution by adopting the
Westminster model. Those advocating a ‘Hindu Rashtra’ based on the ‘manusmriti’
have not accepted this Constitution. Hindutva nationalism mobilises support by
inducing a feeling of Hindu victimhood and suspicion. It provokes hatred
against Christians and Muslims for having reduced Hindus to being strangers in
their own country. Gandhiji had said, “the hater hates not for the sake of
hatred but because he wants to drive away from his country the hated being or
beings.” (Mahatma (D.G. Tendulkar), 2nd
edition, Vol.7, p.67) Communal hatred in the country takes the cover of cow
protection and cultural nationalism. Some
sections of the media have recently reported how even the ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat
Abhiyan’ launched by the Government, as an answer to the economic crisis, is
actually ‘modelled for achieving a ‘Hindu economy’ propagated by the Hindutva
forces. (The Caravan, ‘Scriptural
Economy’, July 23, 2020)
Communal hate finds State patronage
After
2014, communal hatred appears to have been mainstreamed as nationalism. It gets
disguised as citizen vigilantism, to assist the Indian State in preserving law
and order by exposing illegal cow slaughter, religious conversions and Maoist
conspiracies. While the Indian Government is going all out to uproot Muslim infiltrators
who have slipped into the country from neighbouring countries over the last 70
years, it shows no will in tackling the caste and communal hatred. It is
obvious, that polarisation of society on caste and religious lines, provides
huge political dividends for Indian politicians. The phenomenal rise of the
Bharatiya Janata Party, which is the political wing of the Sangh Parivar - though the organisation calls itself a social
organisation and denies any link with politics - has proved that engineering
religious polarisation is an effective tool in capturing political and economic
power. A bill titled “Communal Violence (Prevention, Control and Rehabilitation
of Victims) Act”, which was tabled in Parliament by the then Congress
Government in 2005, is gathering dust under the present regime. Religious
intolerance has never been so overt and pronounced in India’s governance, as in
present times.
Hatred by design and not misunderstandings
India’s
communal hatred, in this age of technology and ease of communication, is not
about misunderstandings resulting from a lack of information about the
scriptures, teachings and motives of each other’s religions. If lack of
knowledge about the religion and its motives was the cause for hate, then how
will one explain how millions of Hindus who studied or worked in Christian
institutions are collaborating in anti-Christian hate agendas? Incorporating
saffron robes, yoga and vegetarianism in Christian lifestyle is not going to
reduce communal hatred. The approach of showing the other cheek and emphasis on
love and forgiveness has given an impression that the human rights violations
against Christians will be tolerated. We see how even the current Covid-19
crisis, has not prevented communal groups from propagating hatred towards the
Muslim community.
The
tragedy is that the communities at high-risk of being communally targeted by
the religious majority in this country, have failed to get their act together
due to in-fighting. For far too long, the secular forces in the country have
wasted their energy in proving that Mahatma Gandhi was communal and in blaming
the Congress Party for fuelling communal riots to exploit the fear of
minorities as a vote bank. They play down the threat of Hindutva nationalism and
may even deny that violence has anything to do with such groups. The reason for
communal violence is solely dumped onto politicians and political parties as a
ploy to get votes. A classic example is how the Church in Goa had ignored a lie
propagated since 1962 by Hindu fanatics, by citing the historical narration of
A.K Priolkar, on how inquisition was used by the Church to demolish Hindu
temples and convert Hindus in Goa. This myth which continues to be widely
circulating among Hindus was left unchallenged until recently, and most
irresponsibly, even subscribed to by sections of the catholic clergy.
The
response to communal violence has been more elitist, academic, inconsistent and
top-down in its approach. More time is squandered in condemning and publishing
reports on communal riots after they have broken out, instead of developing an
understanding of the complex hate mechanisms and exploring preventive solutions
to neutralise such communal designs. Eradicating the communal virus in India
has not been as much a priority, as giving publicity to communal incidents and
obtaining justice for the victims of communal hatred and violence. The struggle
against communal hatred has remained symbolic with organising inter-religious
prayer meetings, which are more often like some ‘jugal bandi’ of scriptural
quotes, skits and dances.
The need to unite and organise
In
such a background, it is necessary for those at high risk of being targets of communal
hatred to organise themselves like the ‘Black Lives Matter Movement’. The only
way to avoid such communal abuse is to stop behaving like second class citizens
and stand up to the aggressor, by speaking out boldly and non-violently against
the discrimination and abuse. The religious minorities, in particular, should not
allow themselves to be provoked into violence and stop responding apologetically
to the accusations of conversions from communal groups. All like-minded
citizens, irrespective of their personal faith, have to stop beating around the
bush and tactfully rally together in eradicating this chronic social disease,
which disturbs the peace of every community, including Hindus.
The
false propaganda that monotheistic religions, and not polytheistic religions, are
the cause of communal violence in India needs to be countered. The bluff that communal
violence is about self-defence to protect the religion needs to be exposed. Inter-religious
prayer meetings to foster communal harmony need to be backed up with real
critical conversation around sticky socio-political and economic conflicts
between various religious communities. Every religious community has to take up
on priority, the education of its own members on this issue, particularly by
teaching them how to tackle myths, fake news and abuse - around religions,
which circulate in social media.
Religious
fanaticism masked as nationalism has to be treated as a disease like alcoholism
and drug addiction, and hateful behaviour as its symptom. Knee jerk and
in-consistent approaches to this problem will only enable the disease rather
than cure it. If social harmony is to be achieved, besides appropriate
legislation, there also needs to be a clinically sound psychological approach
by society to tackle this behavioural disease of religious fanaticism.
No comments:
Post a Comment