Secular
means not connected with spiritual or religious matters. And secularism is
defined as the belief that religion should not be involved with the ordinary social and political activities of a
country. (https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/secularism) How far is this true? In India and the world at
large?
We all know
that Sanathana Dharma (the eternal religious
and moral laws governing individual conduct), which is the foundation of
Hinduism, as a religion, as we know it now, is possibly the only one that has
exhortations like Vasudeva kudumbakam
(the world is one family) or loka
samastha sukhino bhavantho (let the whole world enjoy comfort and
happiness). And as Dr Shashi Tharoor said while explaining why he is a Hindu, a
Hindu can even be an atheist (or, may be, vice versa too, at least to the
extent of being accepted by Hindus as one among them).
And history
is replete with examples that we have lived by these tenets throughout the
period preceding the Mohammeden conquests in the north or the advent of
Europeans as mercenaries ever after Vasco da Gama landed in the Kerala coast at
Kozhikkode in 1948. It is recorded at https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/vasco-da-gama-reaches-india
that on 20 May 1948, he was not greeted
warmly by the Muslim merchants of Calicut, and in 1499 he had to fight his way
out of the harbor on his return trip home. In 1502, he led a squadron of ships
to Calicut to avenge the massacre of Portuguese explorers there and succeeded
in subduing the inhabitants. In 1524, he was sent as viceroy to India, but he
fell ill and died in Cochin.
It is not that we gave up living by those
tenets after the mohammedans and European (read Christian) mercenaries
established their rule here for many centuries. Even as late as at the
commencement of World War II it has been reported (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India%E2%80%93Poland_relations)
that a ship load of Poles consisting mostly of women and children had been
deported from there. None of the countries enroute had permitted them entry,
including the Britons in Mumbai then. Finally, they had found refuge in
Jamnagar under the then Maharaja Digvijaysinhji
Ranjitsinhji. His unparalleled act of
generosity, saw him become patron of the first public school complex founded in
Poland after the Second World War, located in the capital of Warsaw, and named Jam Saheba Digvijay Sinhji in his
honour. In 2012, the Sejm ( lower house of the bicameral parliament of Poland) honoured
the 50th anniversary of his death, posthumously awarding the Commander's Cross
of the Order of Merit of the Republic of
Poland, and the
Warsaw City Council named one of its city park squares in Ochota district after him - the 'Square
of the Good Maharaja' .
How Parsis and Jews came here and were
accepted with open arms and how they continue to live amicably and prosperously
in this country is well known that there is no need for repeating it here.
The history of Mahmuds of Ghori and Ghazni raiding this country, looting
and destroying temples and the Mughals establishing their rule, persecuting the
locals, imposing jaziya or killing those unwilling to convert are also
adequately documented and well known. An interesting video I would recommend is
at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_Qpy0mXg8Y.
How the Europeans, who came as mercenaries, established their rule is
also adequately known. Divide and rule has continued to be a part of our
politics even after the last of them had left our shores way back in 1947. Only
worse.
And they left only after dividing the country into three parts and two
countries in August 1947. A Hindu majority India and Muslim majority Pakistan
in two parts- one on the West and another, literally surrounded by India on all
three sides and the Bay of Bengal on the fourth, towards the East.
Then we adopted a Constitution declaring ourselves to be a Sovereign Democratic
Republic. Interestingly, ‘Secular’ and ‘Socialist’ were not part of the
Constitution then. The architects of the Constitution probably took the
secularism of Hindu majority India for granted. In retrospect, there is also reason
to doubt if they could have explicitly used those terms given the actual
contents of the Constitution.
So where did things go wrong between 1950 and 1976 when these two terms
were included in the Preamble through the 42nd amendment of 1976,
without any changes to the contents? And what is the situation now?
The
Constitution of India is touted as one of the largest volumes of its kind in
the world. It has a very flowery preamble promising the citizens utopia. (JUSTICE, social, economic and political;
LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship; EQUALITY of status
and of opportunity; and to promote among them all FRATERNITY assuring the
dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation). But the
apex court wouldn’t even accept it as a part of the Constitution initially. The
Directive Principles of State Policy are just there on paper, except possibly
Article 50 which states that ‘The State shall take steps to separate the
judiciary from the executive in the public services of the State’ (Now, please
do not ask me who is this State. My guess is as good as yours.) They cannot be
legally enforced. Of the 395 articles, only 24 articles deal with fundamental
rights of citizens that can be enforced through courts, and that is
theoretically.
Now, let us
look at these fundamental rights and how they go against the letter and spirit
of the Preamble (which we need to accept as laying the frame work for the
interpretation of the provisions of this Holy Book of our democracy).
On laws
inconsistent with or in derogation of the fundamental rights, Art 13(2) lays
down that The State shall not make any
law which takes away or abridges the rights conferred by this Part and any law
made in contravention of this clause shall, to the extent of the contravention,
be void.
But in 1971,
by the 24th Amendment to the Constitution, Art 13(4) was inserted as Nothing in this article shall apply to any
amendment of this Constitution made under article 368. This was on the eve
of the 1971 war which liberated Bangladesh. The war clouds had been gathering
since the summer of that year with the PM, Mrs Indira Gandi, asking the then
Chief of Army Staff, General (later Field Marshal) Sam Manekshaw, to sort out
the refugee problem by intervening in the then East Pakistan militarily. (I have spelt
the surname as Gandi to differentiate it from the surname of the Father of the
Nation, which is Gandhi)
And what is
it that had been laid down in Art 368? It is about making amendments to the
Constitution. Without going into the nitty-gritties, the fact that stands out
is that, by the same 24th amendment, the Parliament took upon itself
to add, vary or repeal any provision
of the Constitution, dealing the first blow to Art 13(2). Also, the power of
the President was cut down. Originally, the Bill passed by the Parliament had
to be presented to the President for his assent and upon such assent being given to the Bill, it would become law.
Now, the Bill presented to the President
had to be given assent. He was left with no discretion.
It should be
noted that these were periods when the Congress had absolute majority in
Parliament and Indira Gandi was the Prime Minister, with authoritarianism as a
prominent streak in her character. (She had been hailed as the only man in her Cabinet.)
Through the
42nd amendment to the Constitution, during the Emergency in 1976, even the
fundamental rights were made amendable. Sec 55 of this amendment had made it
unambiguous that there shall be no limitation whatever on the constituent
power of Parliament to amend by way of addition, variation or repeal the
provisions of this Constitution under this article (368)." And that No amendment under this article shall be
called in question in any court on any ground.
This led to
even the apex court declaring (in ADM Jabalpur case, 28 Apr 1976) that even
right to life was not a fundamental right during the Emergency. Thankfully,
these amendments were held invalid in 1980 by the same apex court.
Since we are
discussing secularism, we shall straight away have a look at articles 25 to 28
which deal with the Right to Freedom of Religion.
Article 25(1)
provides that all persons are equally
entitled to freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practise and
propagate religion. Nail one on
this right is that there are no reasonable restrictions on propagating
religion. There is no need to elaborate on what has been the consequences of
this lapse. The basic premise of any right- your liberty ends where my nose
begins-had been given the by. Is it difficult to comprehend that
proselytization has been one of the greatest curses of mankind and the root of
much of the disharmony that exists in the world today?
The next sub
clause is worse. Article 25(2) provides for regulating
or restricting any economic, financial, political or other secular activity
which may be associated with religious practice and throwing open of Hindu religious institutions of a public character to
all classes and sections of Hindus. While the first part may look fair the issue
is with implementation. Except for the Hindu religious or religion related
institutions, it appears that the governments in the country do not find any
need to regulate or restrict any
economic, financial, political or other secular activity which may be
associated with religious practices of other religions. The bigotry in
the second part is obvious.
In fact,
even the apex court messed it up, in its 2018 Sabarimala verdict, while
interpreting this provision for opening Hindu
religious institutions of a public character to all classes and sections of
Hindus. Does
gender and age figure anywhere here? And who were the women whom the Kerala
Police tried to escort to the temple at Sabarimala in 2018? Were all of them Hindus?
Not.
The next
article, 26, provides the freedom to manage religious affairs, that is, to establish
and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes; to manage its
own affairs in matters of religion; to own and acquire movable and immovable
property; and to administer such property in accordance with law. Here again, wasn’t the apex court order in
the case of Sabarimala, violative of the freedom guaranteed to Hindus to manage
its own affairs in matters of religion?
Article 27
provides for tax exemption on expenses
for the promotion or maintenance of any particular religion or religious
denomination. Here again there are reports of misappropriation of Hindu
temple funds by the government agencies entrusted with the management of the
funds as well as the institutions. There are other resources like land owned by
temples being encroached upon and these agencies not taking any action to
retrieve it. Recently there were reports in the local media in Kerala of Devaswom
Boards interfering even with the rituals of temples under their charge. Curiously, these Boards have been
taking over and administering only temples with high income from donations by
devotees.
Article 28
bans religious instructions in schools. But it applies only to fully state
funded schools and not to state administered or state aided schools. Why? Or
let me ask it differently. Why should there be religious teachings in regular
schools where students from all religious faiths could be studying? And, if
there are exclusive schools for teaching religion why should they be aided by
the state?
If this is
the state with rights provided exclusively under freedom of religion, religion-based
biases are available in plenty elsewhere also.
Take the
Right to Equality. Art 15(1) states that The
State shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds only of religion,
race, caste, sex, place of birth or any of them. And in Art 15(3) goes on
to create an exception, stating that Nothing
in this article shall prevent the State from making any special provision for
women and children. Wouldn’t it
have been better if those who had drafted and approved the
Constitution had simply left out ‘sex’ from Art 15(1)? But that is not all. In what all
forms that we are asked to fill up by the government on various occasions,
right from the time of joining a school, are we required to mention our religion
and caste?
In less than
a year of the Constitution coming into force the 1st amendment was
made to make special provisions for the
advancement of Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes too. As an aside, should I point out
it was not for SC/ ST women and children only?
Similarly,
Art 16(2) states that No citizen shall,
on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, descent, place of birth,
residence or any of them, be ineligible for, or discriminated against in
respect of, any employment or office under the State. And, in Art 16(4)
goes on to create an exception, stating that Nothing in this article shall prevent the State from making any
provision for the reservation of appointments or posts in favour of any
backward class of citizens which, in the opinion of the State, is not
adequately represented in the services under the State.
To be blunt,
with the kind of success of the political demand for ‘sons of the soil’, do
these articles have any more relevance? It is to be noted that even reservation
is allowed only for backward classes. But what do we have on the ground? Isn’t
it a joke on the nation that this is a country where everyone is vying to be
backward? And how is backward defined? Caste wise? Religion wise? And there is
the continuing challenge of defining a creamy layer among the, yes, backward
classes. Not to forget the backward among the forward classes.
The question
that one needs to ask is why is it that even after 70 years we have not been
able to define what backwardness is and evolve a formula for its quantification
? It need not be to continue with reservations but to provide training to
develop competence to those in need of it.
Art 16 was
further amended in 1995 (77th amendment) to extent the reservation to promotions also for SC and ST. The
81st amendment of 2000 provided for carrying forward vacancies of reserved seats and the 85th
amendment of 2002
provided for protecting seniority of such promotees
also (with
retrospective effect from 17 Jun 1995).
Coming to
Cultural and Educational Rights, Art 29(2) states that No citizen shall be denied admission into any educational institution
maintained by the State or receiving aid out of State funds on grounds only of
religion, race, caste, language or any of them. We must presume that these
educational institutions are teaching subject as per syllabi approved by the
competent authority of the government. And, presumably, they do not include
educational institutions meant purely for teaching religion.
But the
question arises, can the state interfere with the religious beliefs of the
students studying in regular educational institutions? Kerala recently
witnessed the case of the Director of Medical Education, Remla Beevi, banning
tying of raakhi, on Raksha Bandhan, in Medical Colleges in the State. This when
all schools have extended lunch breaks on Fridays to enable muslim students to
attend Friday prayers at mosques. And, to the best of my knowledge and belief,
even muslim employees in government offices get such extended breaks of Fridays
for the same purpose.
Art 30 is a
bundle of discriminations based only on religion and language. It gives
minorities, based on religion or language, the right to establish and
administer educational institutions of
their choice, restriction on acquiring their property by the State and right to
get grants from the State. The hitch is that these rights are given specifically to minorities as the
article does not mention of these rights being applicable to the religious or
linguistic majority. If it is
presumed that these rights are there for the religious or linguistic majority too by
default, then the question arises why these rights must be specifically given
to the minorities explicitly. Worse, it does not differentiate between regular
education and religious education.
As per media
reports, quoting the Minority Welfare Minister of Kerala in the Legislative
Assembly, there are 204683
teachers spread over 21683 madrassas in Kerala and they are being paid salary
from tax payer’s money. Now they are also eligible for pension after 60 years
of age. Interestingly, in Kerala, most (almost 80%) of the educational and
health care institutions, including professional colleges, are owned and
managed by the minorities.
The Central
Government also has schemes for minorities exclusively. Two of them are: Scheme for
Providing Quality Education in Madrasas and Infrastructure Development (of) Minority Institutions.
Yogi
Adityanath, the CM of Uttar Pradesh, is not a favorite of muslim leaders; but a
report in Hindustan Times dated 17 Feb 2018, stated that his government had
allotted Rs
2,757 crore for minorities’ development and welfare schemes, of which Rs 404
crore has been set aside for the modernisation scheme for Arabi-Farsi madarsas
and Rs 1500 crore for various scholarships and fee shortfall, for minority
students.
To a query
under the RTI Act, a few years back, the office of an Assistant Educational Officer,
in Kerala, had provided the following information: Malayalam, English, Arabic
and Urdu are taught at LP Schools, there are 33 LP Schools (22 of the
government and 11 aided by the government) within its jurisdiction, having
between them 16 teachers for Arabic/Urdu. Their authorization is 1 part time
teacher for less than 15 students, 1 full time teacher for 15 to 28 students
and 1 additional full-time teacher for every additional 25 students. English
and Malayalam are taught by teachers who are teaching other subjects too. Three language
formula is implemented only from UP stage.
To conclude,
recently it has been reported that the Assam government has decided to convert
all government (owned? / managed? / aided?) Madrassas into regular schools and
no religious teachings would be imparted at tax payers’ cost. While religious
groups can establish and manage their own institutions for teaching religion,
there will not be an equation of qualifications from such institutions with the
qualifications acquired through regular educational institutions.
Some hope at
the end of the tunnel, finally.
23 Oct 2020
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