Indian Muslim Community Discourses: Continuities,
Changes and Challenges
Yoginder Sikand
This paper is not a rigorously argued or
academically-grounded presentation. Rather, it seeks
to lay out some stray thoughts that come to the mind
as I reflect on my involvement in writing about issues
related to Muslims and inter-community relations in
India over almost two decades.
This paper is divided into three broad sections. The
first section deals with the ways in which the highly
contentious notions of the 'majority community' or,
simply, 'the majority', and the 'minority communities'
have been constructed and have evolved historically in
India. Here I look briefly at how these reflect
specific agendas of well-entrenched social, economic
and political elites, specifically Muslim and Hindu
elites. I then turn to the specific case of the Indian
Muslims, looking at how Indian Muslim organisations
(often with claims, whether real or otherwise, to
'All-India' status) have articulated their concerns
and demands on the state and on the wider Indian
society, using the logic of 'minority' rights. I then
look at the ways in which particular marginalised
groups within the larger category defined as the
'Indian Muslims'
(which itself can be regarded as marginalized as
compared to what is defined as the Hindu 'majority')
are beginning to stress their own identities and
concerns as a means to press demands on the state and
on the wider Muslim and Indian community. The
concluding part of the paper briefly reflects on the
ways in which the Government has responded to demands
made by various Muslim groups and organizations that
claim to represent them.
'Hindu Majority' and 'Muslim Minority': Are They
Indeed Meaningful Categories?
A general and widely-held assumption is that India is
a largely 'Hindu' country, that Hindus form the
country's 'majority community' and, consequently, that
Hinduism is the religion of the 'majority' of the
Indian people. Hence, non-Hindus are described as
'minorities' and the religions that they claim to
follow are considered as 'minority religions'. This,
what is now 'commonsensical', assumption is reflected
in most writings about India, in the country's
politics and by the Indian state. However, as numerous
critics as well as social activists have pointed out
(notwithstanding the fact that their pleas continue to
fall on deaf ears), the assumption that Hindus are the
'majority community' in India and that Hinduism is the
'majority religion' is actually fallacious.
Numerous scholars have pointed out that what we
understand as 'Hinduism' today is a relatively recent
historical construct. There are no common or basic
beliefs, dogmas and practices that can be said to be
central to 'Hinduism'. One can worship a million or
more gods or none at all, regard the cow as divine or
eat it, revere the Brahmins and mock the Dalits or the
other way around, and still be considered a 'Hindu'.
If textbook definitions of 'Hinduism' are regarded as
the criteria to define what it really is, the beliefs
and practices of a substantial proportion of Indians
who are otherwise defined as 'Hindus' could hardly
qualify to be part of 'Hinduism'. If the Brahminical
and neo-Hindu (Gandhian, Arya Samajist, etc.)
definitions of 'Hinduism' are said to lay down what it
is all about—such as belief in the divinity of the
Vedas, the sanctity of the Varna system, belief in
metempsychosis etc.—many people defined by the census
as followers of 'Hinduism' can well be said to fall
outside its pale. In other words, 'Hinduism' is not a
single religion. Rather, it can be said to be a
collection of religions, cults and traditions, some of
which uphold beliefs and practices that others
included in the broader 'Hindu' fold would find
obnoxious or heretical, or, to say the least, greatly
objectionable. Hence, to argue that 'Hinduism' is
India's 'majority religion' is fallacious, there being
no clearly-defined and universally accepted empirical
referent for the term.
If 'Hinduism' is thus an 'imagined religion', the
associated notion of 'the Hindu community', too, is
obviously misleading, and, indeed, meaningless. As
Babasaheb Ambedkar mentioned in his critique of
'Hinduism', a community is a group of people united by
a strong sense of we-feeling and brotherhood. This can
hardly be said to be the case with the people who are
arbitrarily defined as constituting the 'Hindu
community', who are deeply divided among and against
themselves, particularly on the basis of caste and
ethnicity. The very edifice of the 'Hindu' social
order is itself a complete antithesis of the strong
'we-feeling' that defines a community. Indian law
implicitly admits this in defining the term 'Hindu'
negatively, rather than positively—as a group of
people who are not something else, rather than as a
group possessing certain attributes that they share in
common. Hence, according to Indian law, a 'Hindu' is
an Indian who is not a Parsi, a Muslim, a Christian or
a Jew. It is merely enough to follow a religion, cult,
sect or religious tradition that had its birth within
the Indian subcontinent to be regarded as a 'Hindu' by
Indian law, although the disparate groups that are
defined as 'Hindus' in this arbitrary way might have
very little in common, and can, therefore, in no
sense, be said to represent a single community, leave
alone 'the majority community'.
It can safely be said that, owing to the lack of any
strong 'we-feeling' among the groups arbitrarily
defined as 'Hindus' (originally a
geographically-defined term used by Arab or Persian
Muslims to refer to all non-Muslims living in the
subcontinent to the east of the Indus river),
sustained efforts have historically been made by
elites who claim to represent the 'Hindus' to generate
this feeling in a negative way: by fanning hatred and
violence against 'non-Hindus', in this way trying to
build a solid 'Hindu' bloc, defined negatively, as
against non-Hindus, particularly Muslims. As a
Hindutva ideologue once quipped, 'If India did not
have Muslims, they would have to be invented'—for
stoking anti-Muslim hatred and thereby uniting (or,
more precisely, creating) the 'Hindu community' is the
principal way in which entrenched 'Hindu' elites have
consistently sought to project the notion of
'Hinduism' as India's 'majority religion' and 'Hindus'
as India's 'majority community'.
In contrast to 'Hinduism', Islam, as a textual or
scriptural tradition, does indeed have a certain set
of defining beliefs and ritual practices. The Quran
and the Prophetic Traditions give great stress on the
unity of the believers, as exemplified, for instance,
in the notion of the universal ummah that transcends
boundaries of geography and ethnicity. Be that as it
may, what is often described as 'the Indian Muslim
minority community' is not actually a single community
as such in the true sense of the term. Indian Muslims
are divided into numerous sects (firqas), and almost
each sect claims that it alone represents the true
Islam of the Quran and the Prophet's Tradition
(sunnah), critiquing the other sects as deviant, or
even, as is often the case, as 'un-Islamic' or
'anti-Islamic'. Hence, at the purely theological
level, obviously the various groups labeled together
as 'Indian Muslims' cannot be said to represent a
single category. At the social level, too, in many
parts of India, Muslims, like Hindus, consist of a
number of endogamous caste-like groups, and are not a
single unit. This further raises the question of the
usefulness of the monolithic category 'the Indian
Muslim minority community'.
In recent years, a considerable number of studies have
appeared that deal with the historical evolution of
the notion of 'Hindus' and 'Muslims' as categories in
the Indian social and political landscape. This
growing body of literature looks at colonial policies,
as reflected, for instance, in the decennial census
started in 1871, the efforts of Orientalists, their
'native' informants, Christian missionaries, and
particularly, the role of Hindu and Muslim religious,
social, political and economic elites (who, in seeking
to shore up their own fortunes, claimed to be the
'natural spokesmen' of their respective 'communities',
as defined by a reified notion of religion), in
creating and shaping the categories of 'Hindus' and
'Muslims', 'majority' and 'minority' simply on the
basis of religion.
In the case of both Hindus and Muslims, this appears
to have been a careful strategy to bolster the
authority of entrenched elites in the name of
'community'. In the Hindu case, 'upper' caste elites,
a relatively small but immensely powerful minority
among the Hindus, used the logic of 'Hindu
majoritarianism' to maintain, promote and justify
their hegemony, both within the 'Hindu' community
(vis-à-vis the 'low' caste majority) and in the
country as a whole (particularly vis-à-vis the
Muslims). Likewise, Muslim elites presented themselves
as spokesmen of the 'Muslim minority', using the logic
of minority rights to garner privileges and
concessions for themselves albeit in the name of the
Muslim community as a whole.
The immense and continuing valence of social
categorization on the basis of religion (as opposed,
for instance, to region, language or caste), one that
continues to be backed by the Indian state, must be
seen as reflecting the efforts of Hindu and Muslim
elites, minorities among their 'co-religionists', to
promote their own respective fortunes using religion
and religious-based identities as a means for this.
Yet, social categories, once they come into
circulation and become part of the social
'common-sense', exercise their own influence and have
their own real consequences, no matter how stiffly
socially-engaged academics and activists might
critique them. The same is true for the notions of
'Hindus' and 'Muslims' as representing the 'majority'
and the single largest 'minority' community in India
respectively.
The Indian Muslim Community: Discourse of 'Muslim
Community Leaders'
In Muslim circles, one often hears the lament that the
community suffers from a lack of a proper leadership.
Those who claim to be Muslim community leaders and/or
are projected so by the state and the mass media need
not necessarily be accepted as such by many Muslims.
Yet, because of their access to the corridors of power
and to the media, the ways in which they shape what is
seen as the discourse of the 'Muslim community' have
important consequences for the community at large—both
internally, as well as externally, in terms of its
relations with non-Muslim Indians and the Indian
state.
The 'Indian Muslim leadership' can be understood and
studied in many ways. Firstly, in terms of educational
background, there is a clear division between
madrasa-educated ulema and 'modern' educated, often
middle-class, Muslims. Many Muslim organizations that
claim an 'All-India' character, and hence that claim
to represent all or most Indian Muslims
(notwithstanding the fact that this claim may well be
questionable), are led or consist mainly or entirely
of ulema. These include organizations such as the
All-India Muslim Personal Law Board, the Jamiat
ul-Ulema-i Hind, the Jamaat-i Islami Hind, the
All-India Milli Council, the All-India Muslim Majlis-i
Mushawarat, and so on. All of these have their
headquarters in Delhi.
There are certain particular features of these
ulema-led bodies that claim to represent the Muslims
of India, and whose claims are generally accepted by
the state and the media, notwithstanding the fact that
these claims may not be substantiated. Most of their
leaders are from north India, particularly Uttar
Pradesh and Bihar. Most of them have Urdu as their
first language. The vast majority of them are of
so-called 'upper' caste or Ashraf background. These
peculiar features, as I would seek to explain below,
have indelibly shaped Muslim community discourse in a
particular way, although, as I also seek to show, the
situation is now beginning to change.
That these organizations are led and mainly consist of
ulema is reflected in the fact that they see the
problems and issues of the Muslims primarily through a
religious lens. Viewing Muslims simply in terms of
religion is a reflection of the fact that education in
most traditional madrasas remains confined to study of
the Islamic normative scriptural tradition, with no
space for social sciences, and largely ignoring
contemporary social reality. This reflects the general
understanding that religion should be of the foremost
concern to the individual Muslim and to the Muslim
community as a whole, for it deals with ultimate
truths and the eternal life after death, which is
naturally seen as far more important than the
short-lived life on earth. It also reflects the
ulema's understanding that if Muslims were to truly
follow Islam (itself diversely interpreted by
different ulema-led sectarian groupings) they would
win the pleasure of God, who would thereby put an end
to their worldly woes or else would permit them to
suffer as a test of their faith, for which they would
be blessed in the after-life.
Defining Muslims simply on the basis of religion,
without considering other crucial social identities
(such as caste and class) can also be said to suit the
interests of the Muslim religious and political
elites, whose internal hegemony would obviously be
threatened if caste-class identities of marginalized
groups within the larger Muslim community were to come
to the fore. This would also fracture the notion of
the idealized monolithic ummah that they cherish.
Hence, for many, though by no means all, of the
ulema-led groups that claim to speak for all Indian
Muslims, issues concerning Muslims that relate to
their religion and religious identity are of paramount
concern, and this is reflected in their activities as
well as the demands that they make on the state. Thus,
the work of most ulema-led organizations ('All-India'
ones, as well as those that operate at the state and
local levels, many of which are affiliated to the
'All-India' organizations) focuses mainly on religious
education and religious institution-building—setting
up maktabs, madrasas and mosques, publishing Islamic
literature, organizing Islamic seminars and
conferences and so on. (This, of course, is also due
to the fact that many Muslims see their religion and
religious identity under threat). In addition, some
of them are also engaged in relief work, such as in
the event of anti-Muslim violence and natural
calamities.
The demands that these groups make on the state also
mainly relate to issues defined in religious terms:
Babri Masjid, Urdu, Muslim Personal Law, permission to
pray in mosques presently under the Archaeological
Survey of India, subsidy for the Haj pilgrimage,
naming buildings after Muslim personages and so on, to
name a few. These sorts of demands are implicitly
encouraged both by the state and by anti-Muslim Hindu
groups. For governments, these constitute minimal
demands in terms of resource allocation to Muslims,
and an easy way for political parties to garner Muslim
votes. For Hindutva groups, these demands further
reinforce the notion of Muslims as ruled by
'obscurantist' mullahs, of Muslims being 'backward'
and 'obsessed with religion'. At the same time, such
Hindu groups, too, continue to raise similar sorts of
demands on the Hindu side, often those which involve
conflict with Muslims, in order to extend their
support among Hindus. This, in turn, forces Muslims to
be on the defensive, and for the agenda of community
to be defined in exactly the same narrow way as the
Hindu right wants it to, leaving out of Muslim
community discourse vital questions related to Muslim
economic, educational and political disempowerment,
conditions which Hindutva supremacists wish to
reinforce.
The modern middle-class may be regarded as a crucial
motor of change, but, overall, for various historical
reasons, the Indian Muslim middle-class is relatively
small, particularly in the north, where the bulk of
the Indian Muslim population is concentrated. The lack
of a substantial and influential middle-class has
meant that, in many cases, the ulema have taken over
the leadership (or claims to leadership) of the
community. In some places where a noticeable modern
Muslim middle-class exists, it may, in contrast to the
ulema, lack strong organic links with the bulk of the
Muslims, who live in slums in urban areas or who, in
rural areas, are mainly small farmers, agricultural
labourers and artisans. Often, due to widespread and
growing anti-Muslim sentiments, middle-class Muslims
might seek to downplay their Muslim-ness in public as
they seek to 'integrate' into the largely 'upper-
caste Hindu Indian middle-class milieu. Overt displays
of religiosity or concern with the plight of the
Muslim masses might bring on them the (misplaced)
charge of being 'communal', 'obscurantist', or
'fundamentalist' from their 'upper' caste and
middle-class Hindu colleagues and neighbours, whom
they seek to 'integrate' with. Besides, like the
middle-class among other communities, their prime
concern may not be the pathetic conditions of the
Muslim masses but their own quest for consumerist
delight. Further, as in the case of numerous Dalit
organizations, their demands on the state might
concern issues that relate largely to their class
alone, such as the demand that the state declare
Muslims as a whole a 'Backward Class' eligible for
reservations, a move that would, obviously, benefit
essentially them.
For these and other reasons, relatively few
middle-class Muslims do take an active interest in the
concerns of the Muslim poor. This is reflected in the
fact that there are just two Muslim magazines in
English (the language of a large section of the Muslim
middle class) in the whole of the country that deal
with Muslim community issues (as distinct from
specifically religious issues), relatively few NGOs
run by middle-class Muslims working economic and
educational issues (most Muslim trusts and societies
being religious institutions run by the ulema), and
just a single Muslim-run institution in the entire
country that does research work on Muslim empirical
issues and problems.
True, numerous politicians, members of various
political parties, are of Muslim background, and
several of them stress their Muslim-ness in public
too, and not always simply to garner Muslim votes.
However, the fact that most of them are members of
parties that are not only not just exclusively Muslim,
but are also 'upper' caste Hindu dominated, means that
their ability or even willingness to speak about
Muslim economic, educational and political problems is
limited, for they are primarily answerable to their
parties and only then, if at all, to the Muslim
community. For many such 'Muslim' politicians, raising
issues of symbolic or emotional import, often those
that are geared to stir public passions, while
ignoring bread-and-butter issues of the Muslim masses,
is a sure means to win popularity for themselves and
perhaps electoral victories, too. It is oft-lamented
that such Muslim 'leaders' (like their Hindu
counterparts among the Hindus) have a vested interest
in raising just such issues and framing Muslim
political discourse and demands on the state in
precisely this way, thereby, in keeping the masses
'backward', so that they can, as the Urdu/Hindi saying
goes, 'bake their own political rotis'.
The scope for Muslim political leaders not aligned
with any non-Muslim-dominated political party to
sincerely and consistently champion Muslim demands
related to issues of economic, social and educational
marginalization is limited. Independent political
mobilization by Muslims is considered to be a
'dangerous' move, for it quickly invites charges
(unsubstantiated, generally) of being 'anti-national',
'communal', 'fundamentalist' and 'divisive'. Muslim
political activists who have risen from the ranks of
the deprived and articulate their economic and
educational problems, as distinct from concerns
related to religion and religious identity, are few.
Some of them appeared promising when they started out
but later succumbed and were co-opted and corrupted by
one political party or the other. Some others veered
round to a form of communalism that actually proved
determinately to Muslim interests, particularly in
matters relating to Hindu-Muslim relations.
Recent years, however, have witnessed a considerable
stirring for change in the Muslim community. This can
be attributed, in part, to growing literacy, a
gradually expanding Muslim middle-class, and growing
political mobilization across religious lines at the
same time as India witnesses the growing challenge of
Hindutva, which has also forced Muslims to realize the
importance of educational and economic empowerment if
they are not to be turned into the 'new Untouchables'.
Some of this is also attributable to work by some
NGOs, who, although belatedly, are now gradually
waking up to the realization that Muslims are a
marginalized community and that they need to work with
them, too.
This change is manifested and visible in different
forums and in different ways. In some places, such as
in parts of urban south India, middle-class Muslims
have formed small associations and institutions,
including schools, colleges, technical institutions,
hospitals and so on, and have lobbied with state
governments for community causes, with various degrees
of success. In the north, some ulema-led organizations
now work closely with Muslim (and, sometimes, leftist
and 'progressive' non-Muslim) professionals, such as
lawyers, economists and journalists, as well as social
activists and politicians in organizing awareness
drives or demanding that the state give Muslims their
due, in terms of resource allocation, jobs and
protection from anti-Muslim violence. This indicates a
considerable shift in the discourse of an important
section of the ulema. However, these efforts often
suffer from a lack of professionalism, this having to
do with the different cultural capital of the ulema as
well as the often misplaced hostility or indifference
of many middle-class Muslims towards even those ulema
who seek to step out of the confines of their mosques
and madrasas and engage in issues concerning the
community at large.
Little of this work of ulema-led groups, however, is
reported in the non-Muslim or the so-called
'mainstream') media, because large sections of this
media do not find such activities 'newsworthy' (they
often reporting on Muslim issues only in the light of
some controversy or sensational event or the other,
almost always negative) as well as because press
releases and publications of ulema-led groups are
almost invariably in Urdu, in most parts of the
country a language that, mainly due to discriminatory
state policies, has now become, for all practical
purposes, a solely 'Muslim' one.
The recently-released Report of the Sachar Committee
has acted as a major catalyst in promoting these new
stirrings for change within the Muslim community.
Despite the widespread cynicism in Muslim circles
about the willingness and seriousness of the
Government in implementing the recommendations of the
Report to address some of the crucial causes of Muslim
marginalisation, the Report itself has given a great
fillip to forces within the community who wish to
steer it's political discourse beyond what they see as
obsessive concern with religious issues, as narrowly
defined, and with controversies and polemics which
sections of the Muslim leadership, Hindutva forces and
the state are seen as having been jointly complicit in
reinforcing.
A perusal of the Urdu press reveals that many Muslims
remark that the fact that the Report, the first of its
kind, was prepared by a government-appointed team, and
not by a Muslim institution shows what they regard as
the lack of seriousness and commitment of the Muslim
leadership, by and large, to the concerns of the
Muslim masses, the argument being that if this
leadership were truly concerned about the masses, it
could have generated such a study on its own much
earlier and used it to press for Muslim demands to be
heard. Now, however, since the Report is out, Muslim
groups (some led by ulema, others by 'lay' Muslims) in
different parts of the country have organized (and
continue to organize), local level meetings to
conscientise the community about the findings of the
Report, and to press upon political parties to take up
the issue of the implementation of its
recommendations. The Urdu press, long considered to
have been mired in the politics of grievance and
sensationalism, has also taken up the issue of the
Sachar Report in a major way. Muslim groups in several
states have now come up with their own reports on the
conditions of the Muslims in their respective states.
Some Muslim organizations have also translated the
Sachar Report in local languages. This possibly
indicates that political, economic and educational
issues of the Muslims, rather than simply issues
related to religion and religious identity, as
narrowly defined, are likely to assume greater
salience in Muslim community discourse.
The Hegemony of the North Indian Ashraf and Challenges
From the Periphery: The Emergence of Alternate Muslim
Voices and Implications for Muslim Political
Discourses
In theory, Islam is an egalitarian religion. The Quran
stresses that the sole criterion for judging one's
superiority is piety. Neither wealth nor caste count
in God's eyes. Despite this, Indian Muslim society is,
on the whole, divided into numerous largely endogamous
caste-like groups (for which various terms, such as
zat, jati, biraderi, qaum and qabila are used). They
are generally ranked in a hierarchical fashion,
similar in some ways to the Hindu caste system,
although the rigidity of this system of ranking
differs across the country.
Indian Muslims who claim West or Central Asian
descent, such as the Syeds, Shaikhs, Pathans, and
Mughals—the so-called Ashraf or 'nobles'—generally
regard themselves as superior to Muslims of indigenous
origin, who form the vast majority of the Indian
Muslim population. This owes to several factors: the
geographical proximity of West and Central Asia to
Arabia; the fact that the putative ancestors of the
Ashraf arrived in India as conquerors and ruled most
of the land for several centuries; the 'refined'
Indo-Persian culture of the Ashraf and their
historically closer association with scriptural Islam,
Arabic, Persian and Urdu; and a feeling of racial
superiority on account of differences in skin colour.
Historically, the centuries of what is often, but
mistakenly, described as 'Muslim' rule in India was
the rule of the Ashraf (in association with sections
of the Hindu 'upper' castes). It was from their ranks
that rulers, judges, landlords, governors, and famous
Sufis and ulema emerged. Like 'upper' caste Hindus,
many Ashraf tended to look down on the indigenous
Muslims (mostly of 'low' and 'middle' caste origin),
who remained tied down to their ancestral professions
despite the process of Islamisation that they had
undergone to various degrees.
The historical base of the Ashraf coincided with the
Hindu Aryavarta or the 'cow-belt', what is now Delhi,
Uttar Pradesh and parts of Bihar. This is where many
important Ashraf-built Muslim institutions are
located, some set up in pre-colonial times, and many
others during the period of British rule and
thereafter. This was the base of the Deobandi, Ahl-e
Hadith and Barelvi ulema, the Tablighi Jamaat and the
Jamaat-e Islami, and the Muslim League and the
'nationalist' Muslims. This was also a region which
witnessed fierce competition between Hindu and Muslim
elites, being also the bastion of Hindu revivalist
groups. All this had important consequences for the
evolution of Indian Muslim political discourse from
the colonial period onwards, whose effects continue to
be visible even today.
The Ashraf of Aryavarta dominated Muslim politics in
the British period, and continue to do so today,
seeing themselves as 'natural leaders' of all the
Muslims of India. Steeped in a culture shaped heavily
by the feudal traditions of their ancestors, and
hailing from a region that witnessed sharp
Hindu-Muslim polarization and conflicts from the turn
of the nineteenth century onwards, the Ashraf of
Aryavarta saw the Muslims of India in their own image.
Inevitably, issues of particular concern to them were
projected as issues that concerned all the Muslims of
India. (Likewise, 'upper' caste Hindus from Aryavarta
presented these issues, which related principally to
them, as issues that concerned all the Hindus of
India). These ranged from the Hindi-Urdu and
cow-slaughter/cow-protection controversies in the late
nineteenth century, to wrangling between Hindu and
Muslim elites for patronage under the colonial system
and then the Pakistan movement in the years before
Partition, to issues such as discrimination against
Urdu (the language the Ashraf of Ayavarta cherish as
their own, but which they tend to project as the
language of virtually all Indian Muslims), threats to
the minority character of the Aligarh Muslim
University (once the bastion of the 'modern'-educated
Aryavarta Ashraf middle-class) and the Babri
Masjid-Ramjanambhumi controversy. The Aryavarta Ashraf
(as with the 'upper' caste Hindus of Aryavarta in the
Hindu case) thus saw, and continue to see, themselves
as 'natural' spokesmen of all the Muslims of the
country, thus seeking to hegemonise Indian Muslim
political discourse.
This has had crucial consequences for the ability of
other Indian Muslim voices to be heard at the
'All-India' level. Thus, for instance, South Indian
Muslims, who, on the whole, have fared considerably
better than their north Indian counterparts in terms
of economic and educational development, and whose
relations with their Hindu neighbours have been marked
by considerably less controversy, hardly find any
representation in the numerous Muslim organizations,
mostly based in Delhi, that claim to speak on behalf
of all the Muslims of India. This problem is not
unique to the Muslims, however. Aryavarta Hindu
elites, too, see themselves as the arbiters of the
destiny of all the Hindus of India. Perhaps this
stems, in large measure, to the historic
Aryan-Dravidian divide and the deep-rooted prejudices
among many north Indians against South Indians, mainly
on account differences of race, colour and language.
Likewise, non-Ashraf (or so-called Ajlaf or 'low'
caste) Muslims from Aryavarta and other parts of the
country find little or no presence in the Muslim
outfits that claim to speak on behalf of the Muslims
of India, despite the fact that they heavily outnumber
the Ashraf. This owes to a long tradition of caste
prejudice, and the fact that, by and large, the
so-called Ajlaf historically did not witness any
significant upward social mobility despite their
conversion to Islam. Consequently, issues of pressing
concern to the majority of the 'low' caste/class
Muslims, such as rampant poverty, landlessness,
illiteracy and unemployment, caste discrimination,
rapid economic marginalization due to the
'liberalisation' of the economy that is fast
destroying the resource base of Muslim artisan
communities, and the meager representation of 'low'
caste Muslims in government services, rarely, if ever,
find mention in the discourse of Ashraf politicians.
Nor are they often reflected in the activities engaged
in by many Ashraf-led organizations or in the demands
that these make on the state. Indeed, on some counts,
several of these organizations and leaders have taken
positions that explicitly harm the interests of the
'low' caste majority, such, as for instance, in
opposing reservations for Dalit and OBC Muslims, using
the specious argument (which resonates with that of
Hindutva ideologues in the Hindu case) that this would
allegedly divide the Muslim community against itself.
Another section of the Muslim community whose voices
and concerns have merited little attention in the
discourse and demands of the 'All-India' Muslim
organizations, led by the Aryavarta Ashraf, are Muslim
women. This, of course, must be understood in the
backdrop of pervasive patriarchal traditions that
Indian Muslims share with other Indians. In almost all
these organizations, women find no representation at
all. In some, such as in the All-India Muslim Personal
law Board, they enjoy merely a token presence. In none
of these organizations are women in any major
decision-making capacity. Not surprisingly, these
organizations have not paid sufficient attention to
the particular issues of Muslim women. In fact, on
some occasions, many of them have even taken positions
that militate against even the rights that Islam
grants to women.
Although for long subdued, the voices of non-Aryavarta
Muslims, non-Ashraf Muslims and Muslim women are now
gradually beginning to be heard, thereby helping the
issues and concerns of minorities (in terms of power,
not in terms of numbers) within the larger Indian
Muslim community to be publicly articulated and heard.
For many entrenched male Ashraf elites, these voices,
that directly or otherwise challenge their hegemony,
are seen as disruptive of an imagined monolithic and
firmly united Muslim community of which they claim to
be the 'natural spokesmen'. Often, these voices are
denounced as being motivated by 'anti-Islamic'
sentiments, and those who articulate them are branded
as 'agents' of the 'enemies of Islam', described
variously as the 'West', 'Christians', 'Jews',
'Zionists' and 'Hindu fascists'. Demands by
'low'-caste Muslims for reservations on the basis of
caste are quickly denounced as going against Islam
because, it is argued, Islam does not recognize caste.
Ironically, at the same time, the Ashraf rarely, if
ever, marry with the non-Ashraf, and many Ashraf ulema
continue to misinterpret Islamic jurisprudence to seek
to justify the caste system. Demands for Muslim
women's rights, in matters of matrimony, divorce,
education and inheritance, based on alternate readings
of the Quran, are often dubbed as a 'Western'
conspiracy to seek to lead Muslim women astray and
thereby to destroy the community from within.
Yet, despite the odds that they face, in recent years
spokespersons for marginalized groups within the
larger Muslim community, such as non-Ashraf and Muslim
women activists activists, have become increasingly
more vocal and visible. This owes to several factors,
which need not be discussed here. Most of them work at
the local and state level, often along with other
similar groups (including, for instance, Dalit and
largely 'Hindu' women's groups, in the case of 'low'
caste Muslim groups and Muslim women's groups,
respectively). Some of them have started NGOs, or
caste-based Anjumans, of their own; others have
launched magazines and newspapers and even websites.
The demands they make on the state, and on the
community at large, have essentially to do with the
particular legal, social, cultural and economic
problems of these marginalized sections within the
Muslim community, in marked distinction to the
overwhelming focus of male Ashraf-led organizations on
issues related to religion and religious identity,
narrowly construed.
Not all of this effort, however, may be laudatory.
Some of these groups are letter-head organizations,
used as launching pads for promoting the interests of
their leaders or for attracting funds from (often
Western) funding agencies, who have their own
particular agendas (sometimes diversionary and
divisive) to promote. Yet, on the whole, these newly
emerging voices seek, in their own ways, to fracture
the hegemony over Muslim political discourse that the
Ashraf male elites, particularly those based in
Aryavarta, have sought to impose on the Muslims of
India. In this way, they seek to bring new issues to
the fore, helping to shift the political agenda of the
community as well as the demands that the community
makes on the state away from what they see as an
obsessive concern with issues of religion and
religious identity (as defined by male Ashraf elites)
to also incorporate crucial social, economic and
political problems and concerns of the Indian Muslims.
The State and the Muslims
The 'upper' caste-Hindu dominated Indian state, like
its colonial precursor, also categorises and defines
the Indian population according to religion, thus
further reinforcing the notions of the 'Hindu majority
community' and the 'religious minorities'. It is
obvious how this strategy serves the interests of the
'upper' caste Hindu ruling establishment—categorizing
the Indian population otherwise, say in terms of
caste, class, language or ethnicity would directly
undermine the overall hegemony of the 'upper' caste
Hindu minority.
Since the Muslims come to be defined by the state
mainly, if not entirely, by religion, the 'Muslim
question' is generally framed by the state, political
parties and politicians in terms of religion and
religious identity. This is why, for instance, sops
offered by governments and political parties to
Muslims (periodically, generally just before
elections) have mainly to do with questions of
religion or Muslim religious identity: Haj subsidies,
schemes for madrasa 'modernisation', renovation of
mosques, appointment of Urdu teachers (Urdu being
projected as a 'Muslim' language), preservation of
Muslim Personal Law and so on. This politics of
tokenism and symbolism resonates with the demands of
many 'All-India' Muslim 'leaders'. These sorts of
'concessions' are also a cheap way for the state and
various political parties to garner Muslim votes,
entailing minimal diversion of resources to Muslim
communities. For this reason, too, they suit the
interests of anti-Muslim Hindutva forces, who use
these 'concessions' to press their argument that
Muslims are being 'unfairly appeased', a trump card in
their propaganda to win Hindu support.
Even when, as in the case of the Sachar Report,
state-appointed commissions highlight the pathetic
overall economic and educational conditions of the
Muslims, and appeal to the state to live up to its
Constitutional obligations vis-à-vis the Muslim
citizens of India, the response of the state has been
lukewarm, if not actually wholly indifferent. Such
recommendations, like such demands made from time to
time by various Muslim organizations, threaten to
shift the terms of public discourse about the 'Muslim
question' from religion and religious identity to
issues of economic, educational, social and political
marginalization of Muslims.
Little wonder, then, that Hindutva forces have so very
vociferously condemned the recommendations of the
Sachar Committee Report and that the Congress-led
government at the Centre, which itself had appointed
the Committee, has done next to nothing on the lines
suggested by its authors. That, however, only points
to the need for Muslim (and secular) forces to further
galvanise efforts to bring issues relating to Muslim
social, economic and educational marginalization to
the centre of public discourse about the 'Muslim
question'.
Sukhia Sab Sansar Khaye Aur Soye
Dukhia Das Kabir Jagey Aur Roye
The world is 'happy', eating and sleeping
The forlorn Kabir Das is awake and weeping
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Sign the Petition : Release the Arrested University Teachers Immediately : An Appeal to the Caretaker Government of Bangladesh
http://www.mukto-mona.com/human_rights/university_teachers_arrest.htm
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Daily Star publishes an interview with Mukto-Mona
http://www.mukto-mona.com/news/daily_star/daily_star_MM.pdf
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MM site is blocked in Islamic countries such as UAE. Members of those theocratic states, kindly use any proxy (such as http://proxy.org/) to access mukto-mona.
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Mukto-Mona Celebrates 5th Anniversary
http://www.mukto-mona.com/Special_Event_/5_yrs_anniv/index.htm
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Mukto-Mona Celebrates Earth Day:
http://www.mukto-mona.com/Special_Event_/Earth_day2006/index.htm
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Kansat Uprising : A Special Page from Mukto-Mona
http://www.mukto-mona.com/human_rights/kansat2006/members/
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MM Project : Grand assembly of local freedom fighters at Raumari
http://www.mukto-mona.com/project/Roumari/freedom_fighters_union300306.htm
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German Bangla Radio Interviews Mukto-Mona Members:
http://www.mukto-mona.com/Special_Event_/Darwin_day/german_radio/
Mukto-Mona Celebrates Darwin Day:
http://www.mukto-mona.com/Special_Event_/Darwin_day/index.htm
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Some FAQ's about Mukto-Mona:
http://www.mukto-mona.com/new_site/mukto-mona/faq_mm.htm
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VISIT MUKTO-MONA WEB-SITE : http://www.mukto-mona.com/
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"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it".
-Beatrice Hall [pseudonym: S.G. Tallentyre], 190
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