Ayodhya and the Politics of India’s Secularism: A Double-Standards Discourse Ramesh Thakur Asian Survey, Vol. 33, No. 7, South Asia: Responses to the Ayodhya Crisis (Jul., 1993), 645-664. Stable URL hip: flinks,jstor-org/sicisici=0004-4687% 28199307%2933% 3A 7% 3C645%3A AA TPOIG3E2.0.CO% 3B2-7 Asian Survey is currently published by University of California Press. ‘Your use of the ISTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR’s Terms and Conditions of Use, available at hup:/www stor orglabout/terms.html. ISTOR’s Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in par, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use ofthis work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at hhupulwww.jstor-org/journals/ucal hn Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the sercen or printed page of such transmission. STOR is an independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to creating and preserving a digital archive of scholarly journals. For more information regarding JSTOR, please contact support @ jstor.org, hupulwww jstor.org/ Fri Aug 19 09:52:30 2005AYODHYA AND THE POLITICS OF INDIA’S SECULARISM A Double-Standards Discourse Ramesh Thakur if one day the Babri masjid is dismantled, my faith in Hindu catholicism informs me that a large section of the Hindus will be as pained (they want the temple tobe built, not the mosque to be destroyed) as the Muslims in India and Pakistan will be." Ironically, on the very day that the above was pub- lished, the Babri Masjid was destroyed by a 300,000-strong mob in Ayodhya. The demolition of the mosque plunged India into the worst out- break of communal violence since partition, with 1,700 dead and 5,500 injured. The savage communal riots in Calcutta, seat of a Commu Party government for more than a decade, and Bombay, home to the Laxmiputras (sons of Laxmi, the wealth goddess), sent shock waves through a country unaccustomed to seeing such eruptions in its principal cosmopolitan cities. Scenes of Muslims in the thousands crowding railway stations in a desperate effort to escape from Bombay were reminiscent of the mass exodus after the post-partition riots. Other costs included serious doubts about the capacity of the political system to cope with the crisis of confidence and the fright given to international investors just when they ‘were beginning to accept the government's commitment to economic liber- alization and reforms. ‘The militant Hindus gloat over the avenging of past centuries of Mustim rule, while the average Indian Muslim is sullen, frustrated, and bitter. The English language press in India reported and reacted to the events in the language of secularism, constitutionalism, and rule of law. I shall argue here that the communalization of politics by the Bharatiya Janata Party Ramesh Thakur ie Profesor of International Relations and Direc: {or of Asian Studies, University of Otago, New Zealand. (© 1993 by The Regents ofthe University of California 1. Saeed Nagy, “Musings of a Muslim,” Sunday Timer of Inia, 6 December 1992. os646 ASIAN SURVEY, VOL. XXXII, NO. 7, JULY 1993, (BIP) is the proximate cause of the Ayodhya crisis. But the cataclysmic events of December 6, 1992, and after are also symptoms of a pervasive regime decay that has slowly been eating away at the Indian state. The appeal of fundamentalism in a religious community that has no history of zealotry has grown alongside a demise in the moral authority of the state. By the same token, the crisis offers a new opportunity to retreat from the discourse of double standards, abandon the search for “vote banks” based ‘on promoting confrontational group rights, and return to the notion of rights that every Indian qua Indian has. Constitutional Secularism While most religions preach universal brotherhood, religion has been a source of friction throughout human history. The Subcontinent has been especially unfortunate in this respect. Secular and sacred authority were separated in the traditional Hindu social order through the varnashrama- dharma system: “The Indian socio-political norm was characterized by orthopraxy in observance of similar customs and social distance between castes rather than by orthodoxy in terms of identical beliefs held by all individuals”? This enabled social cohesion to be maintained within a pat- tem of diversity; state-enforced orthodoxy was neither necessary nor possi- ble, Islam by contrast is distinctive for uniting the spiritual and temporal aspects of social order. ‘Yet historically, conflicts and alliances between rulers in India were based on political clashes of interests and expediency rather than religious divisions. The most important concept was “loyalty to the salt” and the most despicable betrayal was disloyalty to the salt (namak haram). Rul- ers, in establishing dynasties, found it expedient to promote this concept, in return accepting responsibility for guarding all the faiths of their sub- jects. Loyalty was reciprocal, imposing rights and obligations on both ruler and subject. Akbar, the greatest Mughal emperor (1556-1605), pro- jected such an image by forging matrimonial alliances with Hindu Rajput clans and by merit-based recruitment of people of all faiths into high state offices. In 1563 he abolished the tax that had long been exacted by kings from pilgrims traveling to worship at sacred Hindu sites. In 1564 he re- mitted the hated jziya (non-Muslim poll tax), “and with that single stroke of royal generosity won more support from the majority of India’s popula- 2, Sunt Mansingh, “State and Religion in South Asia: Some Reflection,” South Asia Journal 43 (1981), p. 297. Varnashrama isthe Hindu casiation of society and ie into Tou divisions and orders; dharma refers o the duty pertaining to a particular caste or order.RAMESH THAKUR 647 tion than all other Mughal emperors combined managed to muster by their conquests.”? ‘The British policy of divide and rule hardened vertical divisions along sectarian lines, The Government of India Act of 1935 introduced the prin- ciple of communal representation throughout the political system, elevat- ing religious identity above all else and providing separate electorates for Hindus and Muslims. Political coalitions began to be built along commu- nal lines; religious leaders acquired vested interests in demonstrating nu- merically large followings as the surest path to political power; accommodation and consociationalism lost any politcal utility. Moham- ‘med Ali Jinnah, “the father of Pakistan,” claimed and was conceded polit- ical importance up to 1947, not as the leader of a major political party but as the leader of the Muslims living in the Hindu majority area of the Sub- continent. The problem of religious minorities was not solved by parti tion—a policy of divide and leave. Governments in Pakistan continue to seek sanctification of political rule in religious legitimacy. General Zia ul- Haq tried to harness Islamic revivalism in order to equate his military rule with Pakistan and Islam; political opposition could then be dealt with as, treason to the nation and the community. ‘Although Hindus formed more than four-fifths of the population of in- dependent India, ths sil left significant numbers of Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, and Jains. The religious minorities were apprehensive of being swamped by Hindus if the majority community chose to act as a voting bloc in a representative system of government. Secularism, one of the major principles of the Indian Constitution, can mean one or both of two things: equal and due respect forall religions and faiths, expressed in Sanskrit as sarva dharma samabhav (let all religions prosper); or separa tion of the state from the church. But in its second meaning secularism militated against the historical relationship between state and church in India in both the Hindu and Islamic contexts. The Preamble to the Con- stitution declared one of the objectives to be to secure to all citizens of India the freedom of faith, belie, and worship. The chapter on fundamen- tal rights provided a constitutional guarantee to minority groups that their sensitivities could not be overridden in a majoritarian democracy. The framers, believing that this was insufficient assurance to religious minori- ties, incorporated a separate group of rights in Articles 25-28 focusing on the right to freedom of religion. Constitutionally, there is no state religion in India. No religious denom- ination is accorded any special privilege or discriminated against; the 3. Stanley Wolpert, A New History of India (New York: Oxford University Press, 1977), pir.648 ASIAN SURVEY, VOL, XXXII, NO. 7, JULY 193, rights conferred by the Constitution are equally available to every citizen. The right of any citizen to aspire to, and seek the highest office of state embodies secularism in the political realm. The constitutional protection of religious rights extends from freedom of religious thought and obser- vance to the maintenance of charitable and educational institutions by all religions. “Positive” religious freedoms are underpinned by a set of “nega tive” religious rights, The state is enjoined not to discriminate against any citizen on the basis of religion in any matter, and in particular in regard to access t0, oF use of public places, employment, and admission into any educational institution maintained wholly or aided by the state. But the Constitution does circumscribe religious freedom with three qualifications: public order, morality, and health. Infanticide and sati (widow-burning), for example, cannot be practiced in the name of religious rituals sanctified by centuries of custom. Similarly, the state was permitted to enact measures of social reform, for example, opening up Hindu reli gious institutions of a public character to all casts, classes, and sections of society. This was a corollary to the abolition of untouchability, ensuring that social inequalities could not be legally perpetuated under the cloak of religion. ‘The scope of freedom of religion conferred by the Constitution hhas been widened by judicial interpretation to the effect that it guarantees not just the right to practice and propagate religious faith and belief, but also all rituals and observances that are regarded as integral parts of @ religion by its adherents. The Retreat from Secularism Jawaharlal Nehru was a major architect of the Constitution. During his tenure as prime minister (1950-64), he tried to give “flesh and blood” to the constitutional principles. His government was inclusive, representative of the myriad strands of Indian society, committed to promoting secular- ism, sensitive to conventions governing relations between the government and opposition benches, and generally careful not to intrude upon state rights. The fact that state governments were almost all under the control of the Congress Party helped. Since the 1960s, however, politicians have gradually become less cosmopolitan and more provincial, while federalism hhas become more complex, requiring bargaining and accommodation be- tween governments run by different political partes. In time, some parties began to attack Nehru’s legacy of tolerating reli ious diversity as “‘pseudo-secularism” and “appeasement” of Muslims ‘Their attacks gained credence with attempts by Prime Ministers Indira and Rajiv Gandhi to build “vote banks” along sectarian divides. There wwas a series of laws, decisions, and polices that cumulatively seemed to demand adherence of the majority community to secularism while conced-RAMESH THAKUR 649 ing to the Muslim minority the right to live by other norms. By insisting that on some matters Muslims should be exempt from the requirements of secularism, Mustim and government leaders progressively eroded the very secularism on which the security of Muslims depended in a Hindu-major- ity country. Permitting Muslim men to have four wives, for instance, is grist to the Hindu chauvinist’s propaganda mill that India eventually will be overrun by Muslims. The Shah Bano Controversy Similarly, the Hindu Succession Act of 1956 gave Hindu women the right to inherit a share of their patrimony, while Muslim women remained sub- Ject to anachronistic religious laws. Indians had already become conscious cof women’s unequal position in the eyes of Islamic law in neighboring Pak- istan, Under the ordinance introduced by President Zia ul-Haq, for exam- ple, rape had to be substantiated by four male witnesses and the victim was required to identify the rapist. Safia, a 16-year-old blind girl, gave birth as result of a double rape. To the Pakistani courts this made her an adulter- ess and she was sentenced to 16 public lashes and three years in jail. The ‘most celebrated case in India is that of Shah Bano, an elderly Muslim ‘woman who sought recourse in the civil courts for maintenance support from her former husband who had divorced her. Some Muslim leaders converted the obscure case into a cause eélebre by turning it from a strug- Ble for individual justice into an issue of group rights—namely, the right of Muslims in India to regulate their own affairs. They won, despite a Supreme Court ruling in 1985 in Shah Bano's favor on the grounds that in this instance India’s secular law took precedence over Islamic law. ‘The Muslim cabinet minister, Arif Mohammad Khan, was asked to speak in Parliament in defense of the court's decision, but the government lost its nerve when Muslims organized mass protest demonstrations. The ‘Western-educated, putatively liberal Rajiv Gandhi caved in to the de- ‘mands of the Muslim fundamentalists and passed the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act in 1986. Rights guaranteed to Shah Bano by the Constitution of India were taken away by a constitutional amendment enacted with the specific purpose of overturning the judicial verdict of the Supreme Court, and that with retroactive effect. Arif Khan resigned from the cabinet. P. V. Narasimha Rao was not only a member of the Gandhi cabinet at the time but also a member of the key Cabinet Committee on Political AMars that took the fateful decision to negate the court verdict. Other cabinet ministers were V. P. Singh, prime minister in “Mary Anne Weaver, “Women Fight Islamic Abuse.” Sunday Times (London), a8 te printed inthe New Zealand Times, 28 October 1984,650 ASIAN SURVEY, VOL. XXXII NO. 7, JULY 1993 1990, and S. B. Chavan, home minster in 1992. None of them opposed Gandhi on the issue. ‘The Muslim community in India has paid a high price for that political victory in 1986. During two weeks of extensive travel in India in Decem- ber 1992-January 1993, I did not have one discussion in which the Shah Bano case was not brought up as the ultimate proof of the discrediting of secularism. The Congress government is widely perceived to have re- treated from a publicly stated point of principle for crass political reasons: an effort to shore up crumbling Muslim bloc support for a party that was clearly in deep electoral trouble. To the Congress, people said contemptu- ously, secularism meant endless appeasement by the Hindus of never- yielding Muslim fanaticism. The BJP exploited this sense of Hindu griev- ‘ance to the full, arguing that when a Muslim insisted on his rights, he was praised for standing up for minorities, but when a Hindu spoke of his rights in a Hindu-majority country, he was called a bigot. Party leader L. K. Advani acknowledged later that the Shah Bano case was “a watershed event” in mobilizing Hindu sentiment behind his party.? The danger was recognized by a number of Muslims, one of whom argued that efforts of the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board seemed directed at creating an exclusive consciousness among Indian Muslims, keeping them backward and encouraging reactionary forces. The 1986 Act captured orthodox and fundamentalist Muslim support for the Congress without having to ad- dress the economic and political marginalization of Muslims.® The Satanic Verses Controversy ‘The next nail in the coffin of secularism in India was the banning of The ‘Satanic Verses written by the Indian-born Muslim, Salman Rushdie. This is a rich, powerful, and complex novel in which a migrant’ faith in the religion of his birth is broken but not replaced by faith in the dominant religion of the host society.” The controversy surrounding it brought to the fore the question of the proper constitution of a multireligious society. The political community is not coterminous with the religious, and problems of adjustment need to be addressed where one political commu- nity embraces several religious communities. Political rights may not be distributed equally among group-defined individuals even when, in princi- 5. Sunday Timer of India, 14 October 1990. 66 Hasan Abdulla "Muslim Personal Law: Case for an Optional Reform Act," Staes- ‘man Weekly, 28 January 1992, p. 1 7. A fle discussion sby Ramesh Thakur, “From the Mosse 10 the Melting Pot: Cross: National Refections on Multiculturalism,” in Multicultural Citizens The Philsophy ond Polis of Iden, Chandran Kikathas, ed (Sydney: Centre for Independent Stes, 1993), pp. 107-12RAMESH THAKUR 651 ple, they are distributed equally among all citizens. The disjunction be- ‘tween individuals’ membership in discrete politcal and religious communities attracts the interest of political theorists because of a tension ‘between conceptions of how to treat individuals justly as members of reli sious communities and as citizens. Westerners can have dificulty coming to terms with the idea that the self is embedded in its social environment; many non-Western socities have difficulty conceiving of individual identity outside its cultural context. ‘The paradox of individual versus collective rights can be illustrated by the right to self-determination. Individuals exercise the right; the outcome of the exercise is to determine the fate of collectivties. Similarly, the right of freedom of religion is simultaneously an individual right—the right of any person to choose between religions—and a collective right—that of the ‘members of any religion to maintain the beliefs, practices, and symbols of their faith. The individual's right would be an empty concept if unaccom- panied by the right of the group. A Muslim in India has the right to be- lieve in and practice Islam; the Muslims in India have the corresponding right to maintain the Islamic community. Neither is complete without the other: ‘The Rushdie affair threw up four different conceptions of equal treat- ‘ment in law in a multireligious society ‘the orthodox view that the state may not persecute or suppress any religion but remains free to reflect the dominant religion in society, i.e, blasphemy ‘against the Hindu faith would be illegal in India; ‘© the notion that all religions should be equally protected by the law, i, blas- pphemy against any religion should be banned: ‘© the belief that all religions should be left equally unprotected by the law, Le, there should be no blasphemy law; ‘© the legal equivalent of afimative action: anti-diserimination legislation seeks to provide special protection to women and minorities because they are perceived to be under special threat. Similarly, a particular religion under exceptional threat in a given political or social climate could be given ex- traordinary measures of protection. Structures of belief are not common to all religions. Islam is distinctive in its concept of treason to the universal community of the umma (faith- ful), In reality, as in Satanic Verses, the custodians of absolute truth rose up in defense of the divine nature of truth as revealed via the prophet. The status of truth is not easily investigated in religious matters, but belie in such truth is held crucial to the identity of self-definition of Muslims living in India (as in the West). An assault on beliefs, therefore, becomes an attack on their persons. This is a dangerous game to play and it was turned against the Muslims in the Ayodhya controversy. Hindu funda-652. ASIAN SURVEY, VOL. XXXIIL, NO. 7, JULY 1993 ‘mentalist leaders insisted that the actual historical record was irrelevant. Religion is a matter of faith and belief, and if Hindus believe that a temple to Ram once stood on the site, this belief gave extraconstitutional sanction to their program. The continuing existence of the mosque on a site so sacred to Hindus, they argued, was a continuing assault on every Hindu personally. ‘The Rusdie affair and the Ayodhya controversy demonstrate the diffi cculty of basing public rules in a plural society on religion. In a society characterized by moral and religious diversity, legal restrictions must be grounded in reasons that everyone can share. The force of religiously ‘based arguments will be rejected by adherents of competing faiths, but the faithful are not prevented from recognizing the validity of arguments grounded in secularism. Hence, the imbalance in the recognition of reli- ‘gious and nonreligious values in the public realm of multicultural societies. The Satanic Verses may have offended Muslims but none was thereby prevented from practicing the faith. “Freedom of religion” means the freedom to live and worship according to one’s religious beliefs, Freedom of expression is functionally meaningless if it does not include the freedom. to offend. If t is inoffensive, then it does not need safeguarding. Equali is the right to be critical of anyone without discrimination on grounds of race, creed, or gender. Secularism predicated on religious pluralism should not be confused with religious relativism. A variant of cultural relativism would impose limits on the freedom of expression by proscrib- ing attacks on beliefs that could lead to public disorder. This was the basis, ‘on which the Satanic Verses was banned in India, and it has two deleteri- ‘ous consequences. Practically, it can lead to threats to create disorder by any group that wants to stop anything it dislikes; philosophically, it amounts to penalizing the victims rather than the perpetrators of disorder. In June 1992 Professor Mushirul Hasan of the Muslim Jamia Millia University said in an interview that while he disapproved of the Satanic Verses, he was opposed to the book's banning. The goal of a ban is to prevent people from reading a book. But the very act of banning gives a bbook notoriety, excites people’s curiosity, and leads more people to read it clandestinely. In his view, those who disagree with the contents or ‘message of a book should engage the author in debate and attempt to de- molish his arguments. The interview produced a violent reaction from fundamentalist students who began an agitation for Mushir’s resignation. A lecturer who disagreed with their demands was beaten up by the agita- tors; other dissenting teachers (about half the total staff at the university) were threatened with rapes of their daughters Asghar Ali Engineer, director of the Institute of Islamic Studies, com- ‘mented that this “is not mere intolerance, itis degenerate conduct.” HeRAMESH THAKUR 653, disagreed with Mushir on the question of whether the book should have been banned but insisted that Mushir had the right to express his opinions. The ensuing storm of protest merely reinforced perceptions of Islamic cralism and intolerance. Asghar Ali argued further that former Prime Minister V. P. Singh, “by pandering to the demands of some opportunistic ‘Muslim politicians” in joining the demand for Mushir’s resignation, risked causing “immense harm to the cause of Muslims in this country. Such stances give credibility to the BJP charge that some parties see in the Mus- lims nothing but a tempting vote-bank.” In Asghar Ali's view: “Any ‘movement promoting intolerance can only be harmful for the minority community. It provides legitimacy to majority communalism.’ The Bharatiya Janata Party If secularism is understood as the gradual displacement of ascriptive ties of religion, caste, and ethnicity by achievement-based calculations, then the opposite has happened in India. Far from being confined to the private sphere, caste and religion have come forcefully onto the center stage of Public life, and the BJP has been a major beneficiary of the progressive attenuation of secularism. The party, which held only two seats in the Eighth Lok Sabha, increased its tally 0 85 in the 1989 election with 11.4% of the vote, and t0 119 in 1991 with 19.99% of the vote. ‘Although the BIP's successes have a manifold explanation that includes organizational and leadership skills its 1989 and 1991 triumphs were built mainly on two factors: an unapologetic identity based on nationalism and patriotism and an exploitation of Hindu sentiments. In its own version of liberation theology, the BIP decided to liberate the Hindu god Ram, whose supposed birthplace site in Ayodhya was occupied by the Babri Mosque. In September 1990, party leader Advani launched a nationwide campaign in support of the movement for the construction of a temple to Ram in Ayodhya. He engaged in a 10,000-km ratha yatra (chariot jour- ney) ina jeep painted to look like a war chariot, calling upon the people to demonstrate Ram bhakti (Ram worship) and lok shakti (people power). ‘The slogan adopted by the party was mandir wohin banayenge (we will build the temple there, and only there). In contemporary newspeak, the program was justifed on grounds of maintaining national unity and inte- gration. In realty, when the 100,000-strong gathering of kar sevaks (holy volunteers) tried to storm the Babri Masjid in October 1990, about 30 were killed by police in the attempt and hundreds more died in the ensuing communal riots. “Asghar Ali Engineer, “Liberal Islam under Challenge,” Hindu Weokly, 20 June 1992, p. °.(654. ASIAN SURVEY, VOL. XxX In addition to its good performance at the national level in 1991, the BIP won power in four states: Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh (UP). Ayodhya lies in UP, India’s most populous state, where tensions were never entirely absent after the installa- tion of a BIP government. But the BJP, having provoked a Hindu-Muslim polarization before the 1991 election, realized afterwards that failure to maintain law and order would invite central government intervention. Chief Minister Kalyan Singh used the absence of widespread communal riots as evidence of fair government, but in reality the relative calm was attributable to a refusal by Muslims to be provoked into an unwise con- frontation with an unsympathetic administration. While not inflicting a reign of terror on the state's Muslims, the BJP government subjected them to much harassment, including pressures to convert to Hinduism. As a result, the Muslims became sullen and suspicious. 10.7, JULY 1993 The Ram Janambhoomi-Babri Masjid Controversy ‘The Babri Masjid was built in Ayodhya in 1528 during the reign of Bubur, founder of the Mughal dynasty—hence, the name of the mosque. The courts took possession of it in 1950 in response to cross-petitions from Hindus and Muslims concerning a small altar to Ram that had been built inside the complex. The two chief protagonists in the controversy are the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council or VHP) and the All-India Babri Masjid Action Committee (AIBMAC). Two separate issues are en- tangled in the controversy: is Ayodhya the birthplace of Ram, and was the ‘mosque constructed on the ruins of a temple? The VHP relies on archeo- logical finds, folklore, historical evidence, revenue records, and records of legal proceedings to argue that the mosque was constructed on top of an eleventh century temple marking the birthplace of Ram. But in the end its main argument is the unanswerable logic of religion: Hindus believe the answer to both questions to be in the affirmative. The AIBMAC points to historical and other records, such as Babur’s last testament, to argue that the mosque was not built on the remains ofa temple. Its leaders, such as Member of Parliament Syed Shahabuddin, were on record to the effect that if it could have been conclusively proven that the mosque was built on the ruins of a temple, then the site would have been conceded to Hindus ? “Moderate” Hindus committed to the construction of a temple at the dis- 9. In May 1991 Tour historians—three Hindus and one Muslim—submittd report to the government on the Ayodhya dispute stating that there was no historical or archeological evidence to suggest that any spot in Ayodhya was venerated asthe birthplace of Lord Ram Dror to the 18th century (indy Weekly, 28 May 1991, p. 6).RAMESH THAKUR 655 puted site were prepared to accept and pay for a careful dismantling of the mosque and its reconstruction at a different site in Ayodhya. Moderate ‘Muslims recognized the religious value of Ayodhya to the Hindus and also acknowledged that the structure had not been used as a mosque for a very Jong time. But some Muslims insisted that the mosque had to be left where it stood and the Hindu image removed from under the central dome where it had lain since 1949. They argued, correctly, that the structure hhad not been used as a mosque because Muslims had not been permitted to use it. The VHP, too, rejected a moderate solution to the dispute. Political Profit from Religious Tension Politicians of both communities saw political profit in promoting religious militancy that mobilized entire communities behind them. Few Indian ‘Muslims knew of the existence of the Babri Masjid in 1980; few were una- ware of it by 1990. In the decade, the mosque had been elevated into a symbol of Muslim identity, Muslim security, and Indian secularism. An astonishing number of Indians of all religions believe that religious intoler- ance and militancy is provoked and exploited by politicians for personal and party gain. If the BJP was exploiting Hindus, Abdullah Bukhari, the Shahi Imam of Delhi's Jama Masjid, was doing the same with Muslims: “His ambition to emerge as the sole leader of Muslims has done enough damage to the safety and security of Indian Muslims.”!° ‘When the gates to the disputed shrine in the Babri Masjid were un- locked on February 1, 1986, Syed Shahabuddin took the lead in organizing a Muslim agitation in protest. At the forefront also in demanding a ban on The Satanic Verses, he was to become a favorite target of the Hindutva backlash. The agitation, coming close on the heels of the Shah Bano con- troversy, played right into the hands of VHP efforts to communalize In- dian politics. Calls on Muslims to boycott India's Republic Day observances and setting off firecrackers in Muslim localities to celebrate Pakistan's cricket team victories further inflamed Hindutva passions. The Shahi Imam went on the offensive in 1988 and outmaneuvered Syed Shahabuddin in hard-line resistance to Hindu demands. In the tense post- demolition atmosphere, the Imam was once again in the forefront, de- ‘manding the right of Muslims to offer namaaz (Muslim prayers) at the disputed site. Having appeased Muslim fundamentalism on the Shah Bano and Salman Rushdie cases, Rajiv Gandhi responded in like manner to the ris- ing tide of Hindu anger. The doors of the Babri Masjid were opened for worship at the Ram shrine in 1986, and in 1989 Rajiv permitted the per- 10. Engineer, “Liberal Islam under Challenge”(656 ASIAN SURVEY, VOL. XXXII, NO. 7, JULY 1995, formance of shilanyas (laying of foundation stone). Indeed, he performed shilanyas himself near Ayodhya at the start of the 1989 election campaign. The Janata Dal government elected that year seemed to believe that it could forge an unbeatable electoral alliance of “backward” castes and “Muslims by expanding affirmative action programs for the former and en- couraging fundamentalism among the latter. As a former cabinet minister commented, a solution to the Ayodhya problem will remain elusive as long as the government is seen to be “appeasing the minority fundamentalism. Majority fundamentalism cannot be contained by pampering minority fun- damentalism.”"" Increasing communal tension during the second half of the 1980s flared into periodic riots and killings in Meerut, Ahmedabad, and Bhagalpur. In the 1980s, more than 7,000 people were killed in some 4,500 communal incidents,"? almost quadrupling the figure for the 1970s. The last major riots before the Ayodhya demolition were in Sitamarhi in Bihar in October 1992. There is a fitting historical symmetry here: Ayodhya is the mythical birthplace of Ram; Sitamarhi is the mythical “birthplace” of Ram's con- sort, Sita (legend has it that Sita was found in an earthen pot in the ploughing fields). The Babri Masiid controversy flared up dangerously in July 1992 when the Uttar Pradesh state government showed great reluc- tance to stop the kar seva (holy volunteer work) at Ayodhya. On July 21 the Sant Samaj (congregation of holy men) rejected a proposal from Prime Minister Rao to suspend the ongoing kar seva for construction of the tem- ple and enter into a dialogue with the central government. The following day the VHP asked the kar sevaks to ignore the Supreme Court's commen- taries on the dispute. As far as the VHP and the Sant Samaj were con- cerned, the dispute was beyond the competence of any court to decide. ‘The BIP government of the state refused to countenance the use of force against the kar sevaks and prepared instead for central government inter- vention to enforce the court’s orders Indian federalism is distinctive for granting the central government the power to dismiss elected state governments and replace them with admin- istrations run directly from New Delhi. The president may declare an emergency in a state if satisfied that its government cannot be conducted in accordance with the Constitution. In the past, governments in New Delhi hhad been peremptory and authoritarian in dealings with state administra- tions. But in the Lok Sabha debate on December 21, 1992, Narasimha Rao argued that Article 356 of the Constitution was too restrictive to have 11, Aran Nehru, “Pampering Minority Hawks Won't Work," Indian Expres, 3 January 1993 12. India Today, 15 January 1990, p34,RAMESH THAKUR, 657 permitted him to dismiss the BJP government before the mosque's demo tion and that perhaps it needed to be amended. Students of Indian politics ‘were thus faced by the novel situation of a prime minister justifying non- use of Article 356. Constitutionalists rejected the prime minister's conten- tion that he could not have acted sooner.'% The deployment of central forces can be ordered in a situation rapidly drifting toward anarchy and, if necessary, against the wishes of the state government. The National Inte- gration Council had met on November 23, and the central government had received intelligence reports warning of specially trained squads being ar- ranged during the kar seva for purposes inimical to the security of the Babri Masjid structure. Hence, the disenchantment of many with Rao's inaction prior to December 6. Post-Ayodhya ‘The BIP, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the Hindu Ma- hhasabha, the youth-based Bajrang Dal, and the VHP are known collec- tively as the Sangh Parivar (the Sangh family). The Bajrang Dal, RSS, and ‘VHP (and two Muslim organizations) were banned by the government af- ter December 6 as communal organizations. But the RSS, with a five- rillion-strong base of former volunteers, has operated as an underground ‘organization before, as during the 1975-77 emergency period. The dismissal ofthe BJP government in UP was expected after the dem- alition of the mosque. Some Congress leaders, indeed, had demanded its dismissal even before, and believing they had been vindicated by the events ‘of December 6, they were critical of the prime minister’s putative inaction in not heeding their call and putting his faith in the words of the BJP. This was also the basis of criticisms of the Indian government by foreign governments. But it remains difficult to see how Rao could have acted otherwise consistent with India’s democratic-federal polity. The BJP gov- ‘ernment in UP had been given a popular mandate at the same time as the Congress government in New Delhi. The BJP was also the largest opposi- tion party in Parliament. To impose central rule on UP in anticipation of constitutional impropriety by its government would have been untenable legally and unsustainable politically. The Rao government was guilty, not of indecision and vacllation in tolerating the Kalyan Singh government ‘until December 6, but of haste and panic afterwards in dismissing three other BIP state governments. Stung by allegations of having been too cau- tious in UP, Narasimha Rao took the extra-precautionary measure of dis- 13, For example, A. G. Noorani, “Rao's Credibility Shattered on Article 386," Statesman Weekly, 16 January 1983, p. 11(658 ASIAN SURVEY, VOL, XXXII, NO. 7, JULY 1993 missing all BJP state governments—Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh—after the Ayodhya demolition. ‘The dismissals attracted considerable criticism. They were an alibi for action by a Congress Party bereft of ideas on how to confront the polit- al challenge of the BJP. Having failed to seize the initiative in cleansing the Congress of is inherited corruption scandals on a variety of fronts, the prime minister was inno position to claim the moral high ground from the BUP on any issue. Before the dismissal of the BJP governments and the arrest of about 5,000 senior and middle-ranking party officials, the BJP parliamentary leadership in New Delhi had been on the defensive and apologetic about the incidents of December 6. Afterwards, the party went ‘on the offensive, ridiculing the central government's courtship of the intel ligentsia and the foreign press at the expense of majority sentiments in the Hindi heartland, Psephologists calculated that had elections been held at the end of 1992, the BJP would have increased its representation in the Lok Sabha from 119 to 170 seats.'4 nd Regime Decay ‘The political exploitation of a Hindu sense of grievance was thus the proxi- mate cause of the Ayodhya tragedy. But the ultimate cause was the creep- ing malaise afficting India's constitutional democracy. For this, the chet responsibilty les at the door of the Congress Party. An independent and powerful judiciary is one of the chief instruments to the attainment of the liberal goal of freedom from unrestricted state authority. But Indira Gan- ddhi argued that an independent judiciary was the most powerful bulwarke of an entrenched elite against the democratic demands for equality. Dur- ing her emergency rule (1975-77), the Supreme Court effectively suc- cumbed to governmental pressure and abdicated its role asthe guardian of individual rights against the state. Other institutions of state also faced growing political interference. Indian commentators have long pointed to the unholy nexus between politicians, criminals, and the police. With a steady criminaliation of politics, it is hardly surprising that there should now be a politicization of crime. Politicians are corrupt and held in gen- eral contempt, but feared for their ruthlessness in wielding state power. The police are held in privat ridicule for their mouse-like timidity toward political superiors and lion-like arrogance in dealings withthe general pub- lic. In Ayodhya the police were caught between their legal role of protecting the mosque and the political reality ofa state government that was com- mitted to destroying it. This, and not the narrower consideration of sym- 1 Tdi Today, 18 Sanuary 1993, p. 16RAMESH THAKUR 659 pathizing with the sentiments of the Hindu mob, was the larger dilemma confronting the guardians of law and order on December 6. For every senior police officer in India, there is an imbalance between an impartial, professional dedication to duty and partial service to the group in power. fan officer deals with a riotous mob without worrying about its relation- ship with the state government, he does little to enhance his prospects and accepts a substantial risk of career damage. Cabinet ministers will descend ‘on him, not to praise him but to bury him. So the police in Ayodhya, well aware of the BIP state government's politics, were silent onlookers to the destruction of a mosque that was under the protection of the Supreme Court. The Congress Party, having created this dilemma for the police, is in no position to complain of having to reap the whirlwind. Like Shakespeare's Shylock,'® the Sangh Parivar bettered the lessons learned from the Congress. Showing increasingly open disdain for the constitutional and judicial correlates of Indian democracy, the Sangh Parivar chose to fight its sectarian battles on the streets rather than in the courts. The people of India would appear to have an intuitive grasp of the joint culpability of the BIP (the proximate cause) and the Congress (the ‘ultimate cause). In an opinion poll conducted a fortnight after the demoli- tion of the mosque, 30.2% of the respondents blamed the central govern- ‘ment for the demolition, 29.8% blamed the UP state government, and 17.9% blamed both." Regime decay was accompanied by governmental ‘ennui and policy paralysis. Having allowed a major problem to fester for ‘more than forty years, New Delhi responded to the multipronged chal- lenge of December 6 with characteristic mix of bluster, ineptitude, and confused retreat. Rao began by talking tough; along with dismissing state ‘governments and banning organizations, he promised that the mosque would be rebuilt. But in the meantime, the Hindu mob that had destroyed the mosque had built a makeshift temple on the ruins and installed images ‘of Ram. A new mosque could not be built on the site without frst destroy- ing the temple and the images. In a religiously charged atmosphere in a Hindu-majority country with an elected system of government, which political party was going to dare to tamper with the temple? On January 2, 1993, the district administration of Ayodhya lifted the ban and permit- ‘ed Hindus to worship at the Ram shrine on the site of the demolished ‘mosque. ‘The BJP was in a win-win situation. The government's decision to re- build the mosque, announced in the first flush of post-demolition guilt, was 15, “The villainy you teach me Iwill execute and it shall go hard, but I will better the instruction"; The Merchant of Venice, Act 3, Scene 16. Indio Today, 15 January 1983, p18(660 ASIAN SURVEY, VOL. XXXII, NO. 7, JULY 1953 supported by only 35.7% of Indians. Hindus disapproved of the decision bby a margin of 59:30.!7 When reports started coming in from party activ- ists all over the country that Hindus were solidly opposed to removing the mages and tearing down their new temple, the government began to back- track on the specifics ofits promise. The mosque would be rebuilt, but the timing and the precise location of the new mosque were subject to further discussion. So the Congress, along with its brand of secularism, lost polit- ical points with the Muslims while the BJP won plaudits from Hindus. At the time of writing, dates for fresh elections in the former BJP-ruled states have not been announced. A mass BJP rally in Delhi at the end of Febru- ary 1993 was thwarted by a massive police deployment. A series of power- ful bomb blasts in Bombay and Calcutta in March further complicated an already confused situation, with the government alleging an international ‘conspiracy and the BJP rushing to pin the blame on Pakistan on the prin- ciple of guilty until proven innocent. Is There a Way Forward? ‘The government must strive for a balance between the rights of individu- als, the interests of collective entities, and the interests of the state. Judg- ‘ments on the proper balance between competing claims must include an evaluation of their relative urgency and importance. I offer two proposi- tions: ‘© A resolution ofthe fundamentalism-secularism dilemma may le in the erte- rion of allocative efficiency when there is no other achievable result by which ‘both parties ina dyadic negotiating set are better off!® An increase in total welfare occurs when some people are beter off as a result of a change with- ‘out anyone being worse off. ‘The above criterion requires that for a policy to be socially beneficial, no one ‘should be worse off than before the change and someone should be beter off For those cases where loss is unavoidable, economists bring in the compen sation principle, which states that a policy is socially desirable if those who ‘ain from it remain better off even after fully compensating those who lose ‘The challenge to secularism in India has come from external sources ‘and from within, With Southwest and South Asia infected with Islamic revivalism, the task of delegitimizing secularism in India became easier. Opponents could simply point to Islamic fundamentalism as suficient jus- tification of the need for a Hindu Rashtra (polity). Can religious fervor and secularism cohabit within democratic government? Democracy re 17 Tid, p. 20, 18. The criterion, fest proposed by V. F. D, Pareto (1848-1923, is also known a8 the Pareto criterion and the soliton asthe Parco-optimal solution,RAMESH THAKUR 661 4uires negotiation, accommodation, compromise, tolerance of dissent, and 1 willingness to live together in the temporal world. Religion decrees sub- servience to authority, non-negotiable dogma, and a willingness to bear any sacrifice and pay any price in pursuit of paradise in the world beyond time. Events of 1992 in India suggest the risks of getting the mixture ‘wrong: hell on earth as well as eternal damnation. India is fabled for its resilience. In today's India, religion is the first refuge of scoundrel politicians, patriotism the last retreat of the baffled and defeated. If the diagnosis of the rottenness afflicting the Indian state is correct, then it follows that recuperation of the Indian body politic re- 4uires institutional regeneration. Whatever Hindus might think in the first flush of the installation of Ram idols in Ayodhya, the sobering fact is that it was accomplished by mob rule of the worst sort: defiance of constitu- tional authority with the passive connivance of the police and the state government. Down that path lies total anarchy. Second, if India wishes to avoid a “Khomeinization” of its politics, then it must cleanse the political process of the growing influence of sadhus and sants. The manner and speed of the destruction of the mosque suggest that the episode was more than a spontaneous surge by an excited crowd. Tools, implements, and skills suited to the task were right on hand. If the destruction of the Babri Masjid was part of a calculated campaign, then Hindus must decide on the sanctity of a temple built on deceit and duplic- ity. Repeated appeasement of fundamentalist Muslim demands in the past undercut religion-blind secularists in the Hindu as well as Muslim commu- nity. Tt time for the moderates to reassert leadership in both communi- ties Third, if Muslims are not permitted to integrate into the national main- stream, then a major new terrorist movement will feed on the sense of deprivation of the country’s largest minority. Punjab and Kashmir have created problems enough for the Indian state even though they are geo- graphically localized. Muslims are spread throughout the country. Large- scale terrorism by Muslims would destroy their community first but it ‘would eventually destroy India too. This is where a practical application of the compensation principle might prove helpful Fourth, Indians of all faiths must accept the reality of their history, cherish it, and take care to preserve it instead of engaging in efforts to rewrite it. Trying to undo the past and remedy wrongs that go back sev- eral centuries in time will only wreck the present forall concerned. Indian culture today is a composite amalgam of the assimilation of successive in- vvaders in the past. Modern India and Indians, including Hindus, would be unrecognizable if somehow Mughal and British India could be wiped from the collective consciousness. The task of righting past wrongs is generally(662. ASIAN SURVEY, VOL. XXXII, NO. 7, JULY 1993 doomed; far better to have the self-confidence to take pride in one’s past history no matter how ignoble it might seem by contemporary standards. Guilt is not collectively inheritable. The Muslims in India cannot be held to account for the atrocities of Mahmud of Ghazni (971-1030), Alauddin Khalji (1296-1316), and Aurangzeb (1658-1707). Even the actions of these rulers have to be judged by the prevailing norms and practices of their times. But there is no religious basis or historical relevance for trans- ferring the charge of religious cleansing from them to present-day Mus- Jims. ‘On January 24, 1993, the government promulgated a presidential ordi- nance to acquire almost 68 acres of land in and around the Ram Janambhoomi-Babri Masjid complex at Ayodhya. The land is to be handed over to two trusts, one to build a temple and the other a mosque. ‘The BIP's reaction was mixed. The government's action was a capitula- tion to long-standing BJP demands; at the same time, the BJP was con- ‘cerned about the political profit that would accrue to the Congress from the decision. The Naib Imam of the Jama Masjid, Syed Ahmed Bukhari, rejected the land acquisition ordinance, and the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board, the highest body of Muslim theologians and scholars, directed all Muslims to condemn and oppose the package ‘The probability is that both a temple and a mosque willbe built, but at a discreet distance from each other. The soft option for the government is to delegate the construction to separate Hindu and Muslim trusts and to refer aspects of the dispute to the Supreme Court under Article 143 of the Con- stitution. Unfortunately, since there is no legal point as such at issue, there is a danger that referral to the Court will politicize the judiciary instead of resolving what is essentially a political problem. The judiciary cannot decide upon questions of belief, opinion, or political wisdom, nor pronounce upon questions of history, archaeology, and mythology, and a cabinet cannot “shift the responsibility to the courts for matters for which the government is too weak, too timid or too confused to decide for it- self"!® The judiciary cannot compensate for the inadequacies of govern- ment or the failure of the political process. Pragmatic magnanimity might have suggested a course of deferring to Hindus on Ayodhya, and perhaps Mathura and Varanasi as well. Long before the destruction of the Babri Masjid, it was clear that the Ram images could not be removed from within the mosque structure by the Muslims or by the government in order to make way for a functioning ‘mosque again. The Muslims could deny the site to the Hindus indefinitely, 19, Nani Paiva, January 1993, p. 9 re We Misusing the Judiciary?” Ilusrated Weekly of Indi, 2-8RAMESH THAKUR 663, but only at the cost of keeping alive the dispute and poisoning Hindu- Muslim relations indefinitely. Once religion was politicized by the BJP- ‘VHP and the Muslims, a compromise solution became politically impracti- cable. The final error was to believe that the dispute could be solved by referral to the judicial process. The Muslims could have acknowledged the fundamental importance of the three sites to Hinduism; none of the three sites is of major religious significance to Islam. ‘They could have sought help from the majority in shifting the Babri Masjid to another site without desecration, and gaining assurances that resolving the tensions stemming from the mosques in the three holy Hindu cities would put an end to the challenges to mosques. The Hindus could then have been held to a posi tion of secularism and preserving the sanctity of Muslim religious monu- ments “Principled” dogmatism prevailed over expedient pragmatism. The price has been destruction of the mosque in the most consequential way: by a crazed mob taking the law into its own hands. Hindus have been awakened to their numerical superiority and the power of numbers in elee- toral polities, and the Muslims have been boxed into a lose-lose situation, Reduced to a “position of self-imposed marginalization,” with no bargain- ing power left, Muslims have thrown away the capacity to influence the outcome.*” ‘They can insist that the mosque must be rebuilt on the exact spot where it stood, in which case the dispute will simmer while India becomes an armed police state fighting majority sentiments and the sense of Muslim insecurity keeps increasing. Rebuilding a mosque will not bring back the historical significance of the Babri Masjid; at a time when the need is to build bridges between Hindus and Muslims, it will widen the gulf between the two major communities. And the act of removing the temple by force will lead to killings in the thousands, mainly of Muslims. To reverse an earlier comment, a resort to terrorism by Muslims will even- tually destroy India, but it will destroy the Muslims in India fist. Or the Maslims can now agree to the mosque being rebuilt on a different sit, in which case they will be seen to have caved in to Hindu militancy after years of intransigence against the voices of Hindu moderation. ‘The cataclysm of Ayodhya has enabled moderate Muslim voices to be raised. A prominent Muslim leader in Gujarat writes of the need to aban- don the steady diet of non-issues and focus on the real issues of poverty, illiteracy, and unemployment?" More than half of India’s Muslims, com- pared to about one-third of Hindus, live below the poverty line. Dr. Rafiq 20. Girl Jain, “Beyond Ayodhya's Watershed: Muslims Have to Reckon with Real ties." Times of Indi, 14 December 1982. 21, J. Bandukwala, “Let's Give Peace a Chance 1992, Sunday Times of India, 20 December(664 ASIAN SURVEY, VOL. XXII, NO. 7, JULY 193 ‘TABLE 1 Position of Muslims in India, 1980 (in percent) Central Govt. State Govt. Private Sector Population IAS IPS IFS Services Services Executive UL 33°27 34 44 60 SOURCE: Rafiq Zakaria, “The Indian Muss: Are They Really Pampered?” The Mus trated Weokly of Indio, 2-8 January 1993, pp. 19-22. NOTE: IAS = Indian Administrative Service; IPS = Indian Police Service; IPS = Indian Foreign Service. Zakaria, the administrative secretary of the Panel on Minorities appointed by Indira Gandhi in 1980, has reproduced some very telling statistics to show the great gap between the political reality of Muslims perceived as a privileged group and the social reality of their situation in the public and private sectors (see Table 1). The Babri Masjid Committee called for the annual Republic Day celebations on January 26, 1993, to be boycotted by Muslims, but theologians on the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board ‘and the modernist All-India Milli Council declared they would observe January 26 as a call for respect for the Constitution. Many Muslims, dis- ‘mayed by the intransigence of traditional leaders during the years of the Ayodhya dispute, may be preparing to assert community leadership in or- der to reclaim the middle ground. In the spirit of give and take, the Muslims of Ayodhya could build a mosque at an alternative site where the truly faithful can pray. Muslims ‘must take special care to respect Hindu sensitivities and to wrench them- selves from any lingering emotional attachment to Pakistan. Considering the fate of mohajirs—those who emigrated to Pakistan after partition— and of the Bihari Muslims from Bangladesh, Indian Muslims are not overjoyed at the prospect of having to move to Pakistan, Said one after the Ayodhya demolition, “Even those who went over in 1947 are still being treated as second-class citizens." Instead, far better to rebuild India as, cone nation, one society, one people. 22. Quoted in Sunday, 3-9 January 1993, pp. 4435