Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Why are the Minorities absent in the Jan Andolans ( people’s movements ) of India ?



Why are the Minorities absent in the Jan Andolans ( so-called people’s movements ) of India  ?

We are witnessing some of the much hyped public protests for the last thirteen months in India where the urban youth are seen in the fore front of these protests against corruption. The middle class urbanites have been supporting their children to go forward and protest. The agitations led  by Sri Anna Hazare, Baba Ramdev  , and recently by Sri Arvind Kejriwal ,have exhibited the protesting-spirit of the middle class to come forward to change the political and social scenario.
I have been following these agitations through my contacts in the local groups in Hoshangabad and Betul and through the coverage in the media. I have noticed some issues which I would like to share here.

1.      The leaders from the Minorities are not seen! : I can see a total absence of leaders and leaderships from the Minorities in these agitations. Well the reasons are not known to me still but the thing as I see is, that the major minority groups in India have almost zero representation in the frontline leadership in these agitations or movements. The minorities, especially the Muslims have been targeted both by the local societies and the ruling Governments in all kinds of terrorists and anti-government agitations. The proofs of the involvement of the young persons from the minorities are doubtful from the very first day but the law enforcement agencies and the courts have done little to reduce the fear-psychosis among the muslims. The repeated practice from all kinds and shades of political parties, including the Left parties, have forced the Muslims to realize that the governments are against the life and survival of Muslims in India. The Right to Education, equality, Liberty, Fraternity and Universal Brotherhood is the basic fundamentals of Islam which were practiced and imbibed by the various Civilizations and Governments all over the world. Islamic Jurisprudence is one of the best and has been delivering free and fair justice to the people. The rulers whenever and wherever deviated from the principles of Islam have been punished and thrown out of power by the Muslims even when the country was under Islamic laws. The fear is set inside the minds of Muslims as the long two hundred recent years from the British rule o the present day Democracies have not shown any kind of resemblance to the basic question of Justice and fair dealings with the Muslim communities. This persecution complex within the Muslims have now spread into the other religious Minorities like Christians, Bauddhs, Jains and the ethnic communities of tribal people. No one from the leaderships of these mentioned communities come forward to put the views for the communities while the leaders like Digvijays or Thakres are allowed to speak all kind of anti-minority or pro-minority statements out in the open and they usually go unpunished. This becomes more revealing as to how these events are dealt with by the Courts of India. The common person belonging to the Minority community  are not eager to approach the Courts for any kind of redresses as they find them to be working against the basic tenets of Constitutions. The rulings of the Courts are hardly ever implemented when it comes to the development of the Minorities. The logic stated is  usually that the ruling party is creating a Vote-Bank and appeasing the minorities. So where do the minorities go for The question is when Muslims may be doubtful of being harassed and haggled by their participations still why other religious minorities are not seen there? The Sikh, Christians, Bauddhs, Jains and notably the Sunni Muslims are abstaining from these agitations. 

2.      Core Group of these agitations have not made efforts to synchronize their agitations at the national and international levels where the religious minorities present are a majority percentage in India viz. the Muslims and the Christians have been doing non-violent and peaceful protest all over the world. The focus is still in New Delhi , Mumbai and other State Capitals. The rural and tribal areas like the North-East and Jammu-Kashmir have not been represented and included in these agitations. We find the majority of minorities like Muslims , Tribals and Christians in these areas but these agitations are not having any effect in these areas. Thus we are able to view the cow-belt with Maharashtra as the major leader in these agitations. The National picture is still missing. They are becoming the Hindi-speaking leadership centered protests. The interventions in the areas affected by the Naxalites and Army have never been seen and the question of maintaining law and order is the priority of these urban protests. We saw Baba Ramdev marching in New Delhi on 13 and 14 th. August this year but left Delhi before 15th.August to facilitate the PM to reach the Red Fort on 15th.August. Morning.

3.      A linkage with protests all over the world is missing. We seldom see any mention of Syria. Egypt, Burma or USA in these speeches. This may be due to the fear, though valid, that allegations may start that these agitations are funded with foreign money and so it is clearly and openly not linked to the International protests however they may be same in orientation and strategy. The leaders are also trying to bring forth the view that these agitations are _ grassroots, indigenous, Indian in origin, led by Indians and are funded by the Indian citizens. Donations and funds are locally being raised and expenses are shared to show that these are totally Indian in nature.
4.      Ethnic Minorities also absent : We do not find a tribal or a semi-tribal( married to a tribal or a convert from tribal community) in these agitations when they form more than 25% of total Indian Population. The leadership is present in the tribal dominated States like Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and the North- eastern States , still we find an absence at the top level leadership.

5.      Absence of Women-Power – I agree that the Muslim women may be prevented by their families and communities to come forward openly in the support of these agitations but why are women reduced to a “ Minority” in these agitations is a question which I cannot find answer to. The women in India have been putting efforts to come at par with their male counterparts but all kind of agitations and religious movement rooted in Indian society have been partially blind to the contributions of women. They are eager to increase the numbers of women in the crowd they lecture but they are not eager to share the dais with gender-biased groups of women.

Now if this is the state of the situation what can really be dine to change this ?

1.      Identify and involve the persons from the religious minorities : When these agitations claim that they have branches and shakhas all over India than who is stopping them to do this ?  Are there NO deserving and capable persons from these communities? Are all tainted, persecuted, punished and terrified of going into jails? Why they are not motivated to join these agitations? The mindset of the top leadership of these agitations have to change and the word “secular” has to to redefined by these agitations if they are to address to the major sections of the Indian Society. We saw Anna ji saying from the last day that the political party will be formed on “secular” basis. This still remains to be seen as to what his “secular” means ! We have seen the secular of Indian National Congress, the Bhartiya Janta Party and the Communist Party of India. They have been using the religious minorities to meet their political-ends without aiming at the development and empowerment of these minorities. Some are into vote-Bank politics and another into appeasements. These agitations have to avoid these concepts of “ use-and throw” minorities. They have to think long term more and involve the participation of the religious minorities at a priority. Same goes for the other ethnic minorities of Jammu , Kashmir, North East, central India and the Some southern States.  

2.      Avoid pseudo-Minorities and Semi-Minorities personalities : let me explain this through examples. We have some in Bollywood like Shahruk    & Amir  ( married to non-muslims  ), Salman   ( worships many kind of non-Islamic idols ), etc, in Political Parties like Salman K.( married to a Christian lady, who  lost the last elections even though he is a Minister at the Center and was looking for reservation of Muslims! ), Shahnawaz H., M. Abbas Naqvi, etc. and in the field of Art and Culture. I am disputing their contribution to the field of their activity but what I am talking of here is what goes inside the minds of Muslims in India is not reflected in the actions of these personalities. The situation arises where even we start hating these personalities once they start believing that they represent Muslims and they are their true leaders. So now we may be left with a handful of personalities that may represent the religious minorities in India and they may be judged on the basis of – education, family background, religious faiths and adherence to the basic fundamentals of religion and experience to lead the agitation,

3.      Educate Minorities on the advantage of these agitations and participation of women :  Special efforts are required to do this in the coming time. Classes meetings, workshop , training materials, social websites, networking with NGOs and Media can bring about a change in the minds of the Minorities and they will address the fear in their minds with the knowledge base that may come through these efforts. These would require money and time but the time demands that they have to be started if these movements are to remain relevant to the minorities. The organizations of these communities can also play a crucial role in helping these movements.
4.      India needs Muslims and other Minorities :  We have seen recently that some groups are propagating the idea that these movements can do without the involvements of the minorities. My point is do these minorities need you or you need these minorities ? If you want to be successful you need these minorities. And remember that the way you deal with these religious minorities you must be dead sure that your actions will be watched by their fraternity all over the world. Being a non-minority hat group is much more dangerous to these movements while it is fruitful to become a minority-lovers in the long run.
Dated 26th. August,2012.
All these are my personal views and have nothing to do with the associations with which I am associated with and working for .
  parvezameer.blogspot.com ( development issues )