Indian
Secularism
The
Indian Constitution is not secular because it divides people
on the basis of religion, as majority and minority.
What this ‘Secularism’ has done is to
institutionalize double standards—one for the majority and
another for the minority. Under
this Constitution, neither the courts nor the Government can
be secular. |
I
will just make a few observations, highlighting how Indian
Secularism as
practiced today by some politicians and a section of the
intelligentsia amounts to a colossal fraud on the people. This has
led to an absence of serious debate on issues of vital national
importance. People are denounced as ‘communal’ simply for
raising important questions relating to national interest and even
security. I will give a few examples of it, but first I want to
highlight a neglected point.
The
Indian Constitution is not secular because it divides people on the
basis of religion—as majority and minority. This means that the
courts and the governments can and do interfere in matters relating
religion. The courts pass religious laws and the governments enforce
them. So there is no separation of state and religion. I’ll look
at a few examples shortly, but the important thing to note is that
the word ‘secular’ was not in the original Constitution. This is
because the authors of the Constitution, especially Dr. Ambedkar,
recognized that it was NOT secular. Other legal luminaries like K.M.
Munshi also never used the word ‘secular’ to describe the Indian
Constitution. It was introduced only during the 1975 – 77
Emergency under Mrs. Indira Gandhi. And the people who introduced it
were politicians and not legal scholars of the caliber of Dr.
Ambedkar. It was purely a political move.
This
allows many purely communal activities to be carried out in the name
of secularism. Let me give you a couple of examples.
All
of us know or should know that last year alone 125 crore rupees were
given to Haj pilgrims. Here is something else that Sri Sri
Ravishankar of The Art of Living Center pointed out. In the
state of Karnataka temples generate Rs 40 crores. The government
gives them back only 50 lakhs. The mosques on the other hand
generate only about 50 lakhs, but get Rs 8 crores from the
government! This means the government is in effect taking money from
temples and diverting it to mosques and madrasas. And I don’t have
to tell you what goes on many of these madrasas. I will probably be
called communal for mentioning these.
In
effect what this ‘secularism’ has done is to institutionalize
double standards—one for the majority and another for the
minority. Much of the intelligentsia, especially in the media,
follows this double standard. You all saw how the media covered the
Godhra violence—how the burning alive of mostly women and children
was sought to be rationalized by invoking the Babri Masjid
demolition of ten years ago. In that case why not we go back a
thousand years to Mahmud of Ghazni’s demolition of Somnath. He
started the whole thing.
This
brand of ‘secularism’ has not only distorted the truth, but also
rationalized cowardly behavior. Let me give you a couple of
examples. You remember how some two years ago the ‘secularists’
turned the killing of the Christian missionary Graham Staines and
his sons into a national and international affair by blaming Hindu
organizations. But only two weeks ago a Christian youth and his
Muslim wife were brutally murdered by the girl’s family. There was
no public denunciation of this act of savagery either by the
secularist politicians or even Church officials. The same Church
officials held public meetings and loudly denounced Hindu
organizations, without any evidence, when a few windows in a church
in Mysore were smashed by hooligans. Where are their voices now?
It
is obvious that ‘secularists’ are afraid of violent Muslim
reaction. They become brave only when criticize Hindus who normally
do not react violently. So they become brave in denouncing ‘Hindu
communalism’, even when there is no evidence, but become
tongue-tied and petrified when faced with the most blatant instances
of minority violence.
Let
me give you another example. When some Hindu groups objected to M.F.
Husain for painting some Hindu goddesses in the nude, the secular
intellectuals including the media defended his ‘artistic
freedom’ to do so. But a few months ago, a newspaper office in
Bangalore was vandalized by a Muslim mob for publishing a perfectly
innocent cartoon of Prophet Muhammad. And the newspaper apologized
to the attackers. Imagine the victim apologizing to the assailants!
Other papers in Bangalore and other places have also apologized on
similar occasions. So in India, ‘artistic freedom’ means freedom
to offend Hindu sensibilities only!
This
shows that what it is behind much of the secularist posturing is
pure fear. Islamic scholars call this ‘dhimmitude’ or ‘dhimmitva’.
These people are afraid of Hindu nationalism because they fear that
they might get hurt in the resulting Muslim backlash, which is
always violent. So they give in to minority demands even before they
are made. They hide this fear using secularism as cover. This is
where secularism has brought us. This is what we should call dhimmitva—
opposition to nationalism born out of fear.
In
summary: Indian secularism = minority communalism plus dhimmitva.
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