The state of India’s Muslims
Asma Yaqoob
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_21-10-2003_pg3_4
The communal frenzy in undivided and divided India was generated either by the desire to control political power or capture economic resources. A large number of communal riots in post-partition India take place in regions where Hindu-Muslim economic and political competition is intense
The general perception about Indian Muslims in Pakistan is that a beleaguered community with little socio-economic power and even fewer rights. However, this generalisation glosses over the complexities of the Muslims’ situation in India. A closer study suggests the Indian Muslims constitute a distinct and important community in India’s multi-cultural milieu. Post-partition, Islam remains the strongest force informing the Indian Muslims’ philosophy of life. Some of the more pressing issues facing the community include the Muslim personal law, better management of their waqf boards and schools, liberalisation of madrassas, equitable share in government jobs, empowerment through education and greater respect for their religious values in society.
Competition between the elites of the Hindu and Muslim communities for power sharing bestowed the legacy of communalism or conflict of interests to India in the post-partition period. Religion has merely been an instrument in the hands of the leaders. The communal frenzy in undivided and divided India was either about winning political power or controlling economic resources.
Indian as well as international writers have highlighted the fact that a large number of communal riots in post-partition India have taken place in regions where Hindu-Muslim economic and political competition is intense. For example, some districts in Western UP where 20 per cent of the population is Muslim, and where a new Muslim entrepreneur class is emerging, have experienced more Hindu-Muslim conflicts than other areas in India. There is compelling evidence that the recent Gujarat carnage was a ploy by Indian extremist groups to wreak havoc on the prosperous Muslim community of Gujarat.
One can offer two hypotheses about the economic and political condition of Muslims in India: the discrimination faced by Muslims at both the official and societal levels and the Indian Muslims’ isolation from the national mainstream. The first is more perceptible while the second is generally overlooked. The mass migration of people, largely from north India to Pakistan at the time of partition left Indian Muslims not only without any educated and strong middle class of Muslim entrepreneurs but also resulted in a leadership vacuum.
One cannot blame the Hindus and successive governments’ discriminating policies against Muslims for the latter’s poor socio-economic conditions. The Muslims’ relatively poor performance in economic and political spheres is largely due to their seclusion from the larger Indian community. This has been aggravated by the kind of leadership they have had since partition. However, in post-partition India, Muslims have shown increasing independence in their political choices. Their voting pattern is largely determined by their uneven distribution of population throughout the country. But their votebank can impact electoral results. According to one estimate, there are about 50 constituencies in India where Muslims can influence the electoral outcome. For example, in Assam and Kerala where Muslims are present in substantial numbers, the Muslim vote is of real consequence.
Muslims in India have varied party affiliations largely determined by the pressing socio-economic problems and political aspirations in different states. A recent report in Muslim India (March 2002) indicates that ‘since independence Muslims have generally voted for non-Muslim candidates of one secular party or another and for different secular parties in different states and — they have accepted non-Muslim national leaders as their leaders — ‘ Since the late 1980s, Indian Muslims have adopted the strategy of ‘tactical voting’ — not joining any political party en masse, but voting for a candidate they think is capable of defeating the BJP.
On the whole, however, the picture remains dismal as Muslims’ share of positions in prestigious services, political institutes and corporate sectors of India is far less than their proportion of national population. Muslim representation in Indian Administrative Services (IAS) is below three per cent as against their population of 12.12 per cent, according to the last available census figures of 1991. The total percentage of Muslim MPs in Lok Sabha was 5.87 per cent on June 30, 2000. The marginal representation of Muslims in the Union cabinet means that they are unable to defend their community’s interests.
According to a study conducted by Omar Khalidi, in the past fifty years or more, no Muslim has been given the important central portfolios of defence and finance. The majority of the nearly 25 Muslim cabinet ministers appointed in the last 53 years were given portfolios that were not finance-related and, therefore, unimportant to the business of the state.
Although one cannot overlook the contribution of Muslims today in sports, the Indian film industry etc, if an all-India balance-sheet were drawn up, Muslims would appear to be losing out. The dilemma faced by present-day Indian Muslims is that they are deeply concerned about their status in the mainstream society; at the same time they want to protect their interests as a community (protection of life and property during communal riots, prevention of discrimination in educational and economic opportunities, preservation and perpetuation of personal law, protection of mosques and religious sites from encroachment) in the face of the mounting tide of Hindutva.
Asma Yaqoob is a Research Officer at the Institute of Regional Studies in Islamabad