New Study Suggests Veteran Advocates Sway United States Supreme Court
By Tony Mauro
Legal Times
10-22-2007
For the elite of the Supreme Court Bar, this is the Gilded Age. Or call it the Age of the Guild.
The Court's docket continues to shrink. Yet dramatic new research by Georgetown University Law Center professor Richard Lazarus shows that more and more of the Court's cases are brought and argued by the seasoned veterans who have honed Supreme Court practice into a fine, and exclusive, art form. Last term, fully 44 percent of the nongovernment petitions that were granted review by the Court were filed by such veteran advocates. In 1980, that number was less than 6 percent.
The justices and their law clerks, it seems clear, pay special attention to the briefs and arguments of these virtuosos of the bar. Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., after all, was once one of them, arguing 39 cases to the Court in his days as an appellate lawyer in the private and public sector. And Lazarus cites a 2004 survey published in the Journal of Law & Politics indicating that 88 percent of law clerks openly acknowledged giving extra consideration to briefs filed by what one called the "inner circle" of the Supreme Court Bar. The clerks, who play a crucial role in screening incoming cases for their justices, often then go to work for these same firms, garnering hiring bonuses that this year have reached $250,000.
But this is not just a "rich get richer" tale about lawyers. Lazarus, founder of the university's Supreme Court Institute, goes a step further to make the claim that the increasing dominance of the veteran Supreme Court Bar is beginning to have an impact on the Court's doctrine.
The study, set for publication soon in the Georgetown University Law Journal, draws a direct and controversial connection between the growth of the Supreme Court Bar and the Court's widely noted new pro-business tilt.
Clients willing to plunk down $100,000 or more for a veteran advocate to petition the Court are elbowing aside the civil rights, civil liberties and labor groups that once helped set the Court's agenda, the study suggests. Recent breakthrough victories for business in tort, antitrust and other areas of the law can't be explained totally by the Court's overall conservative majority, Lazarus says. The elite Supreme Court Bar has played a pivotal role, he asserts.
"The re-emergence of a Supreme Court Bar of elite attorneys ... is quietly transforming the Court and the nation's laws," says Lazarus, recalling the early 1800s, when Daniel Webster, Francis Scott Key and a handful of other lawyers dominated arguments at the Court in landmark cases. Increasingly, Lazarus says, the modern-day Court is ruling in favor of "monied interests more able to pay for such expertise."
Lazarus calls on the Supreme Court Bar -- and the Court itself -- to take steps to reduce the imbalance in advocacy between the well-paid pro-business veterans and those representing other parties, such as criminal defendants and employment discrimination, tort and environmental plaintiffs. "The advocacy gap in the Court between those who can pay and those who cannot," says Lazarus, is "bad for the legal profession, the Court, and its rulings."
LEVELING THE FIELD
But some of the very lawyers Lazarus pinpoints say the problem, if there is one, is already being addressed by increased pro bono work by the veterans and by the recent proliferation of law school Supreme Court clinics that spread their expertise more broadly among parties that need help. Increased competition for fewer cases also means that virtually every private party has multiple offers of help from Supreme Court specialists.
Success Rate for Expert Counsel in Obtaining Supreme Court Review October Term Number of
Petitions Granted Successful Petitions Filed by Expert Counsel Percentage of Successful Petitions Filed by Expert Counsel
1980 102 6 6%
2000 68 17 25%
2005 67 24 36%
2006 64 28 44%
Source: Richard Lazarus, Georgetown University Law Center
Note: Expert counsel is defined as a lawyer who has argued five or more Supreme Court cases, or is affiliated with a firm or organization with at least 10 prior arguments before the Court.
The veterans also dispute the notion that the bar is steering the Court in any direction, pro-business or otherwise. "Effective advocacy can impact the Court, but the heightened success of business has been in the works for 25 years," says Latham & Watkins' Maureen Mahoney, who argued four cases last term. "And you've got seven Republican appointees on this Court who have a high interest in these cases."
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld's Thomas Goldstein makes a similar point. "We advocates tend to think it's all about the lawyering. But the most important trend by far is the increasing conservatism and pro-business orientation of the justices themselves."
All the highly polished pro-business petitions in the world, he adds, "wouldn't get anywhere on a Court with nine Bill Brennans," a reference to the late liberal lion, Justice William Brennan Jr.
Adds O'Melveny & Myers' Walter Dellinger, "The Supreme Court has such capacity to do its own work. It's increasingly sensitive to the economic consequences of litigation and regulation. I don't think I'd attribute that to the bar."
Robert Long of Covington & Burling also points out, "We all file a lot of cases that are denied." But he agrees with Lazarus that these are salad days for the Supreme Court Bar, in part because of "the reflected luster" of having one of its own, Roberts, occupying the Court's center chair.
In response, Lazarus acknowledges that "the bar alone does not determine the docket." But he asserts the modern Supreme Court Bar is having dramatically more impact than in the past. "If we had essentially the same Court but not this kind of bar, we would not have the same number of business cases."
As for leveling the playing field, Dellinger's own portfolio of cases this term indicates that the high priests of the high court bar can mix business with pro bono clients. Dellinger represents ExxonMobil in its challenge to the multibillion-dollar damage verdict in the Exxon Valdez oil spill case. But his name is also on a petition filed for Humberto Cuellar, a drug smuggler who is challenging the federal money-laundering statute. The Court granted review in the case Oct. 15. Dellinger won't argue the case himself, deferring to a federal defender in Texas, but he says it represents an effort by his firm -- and the Harvard Law School clinic he helps run -- to assist first-time advocates even before the Court grants review.
Lazarus acknowledges the role of the clinics and law firms such as O'Melveny, Sidley Austin, WilmerHale, Jenner & Block, and Mayer Brown, among others, which have worked for years -- mostly unheralded -- to improve advocacy before the high court for criminal defendants and death row inmates. But more needs to be done, he says, including the Court itself granting argument time to established groups such as the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers when a defendant's advocate is a first-timer or needs help.
Lazarus' concern has been growing in recent years. Last term, his institute ran moot courts for more than 90 percent of the cases argued before the high court. And in his own field of environmental law, Lazarus has researched the record of near-total defeat for environmental plaintiffs challenging government action or inaction.
From both experiences, Lazarus concludes, "Good advocacy really matters." To a degree that surprised him, Lazarus found that the quality of the briefing and of the oral advocacy -- the way that cases are framed, the arguments that are stressed, and the ones that are omitted -- have a powerful impact on the justices, as independent as they may be.
As an example, Lazarus charts the history of the business community's efforts to convince the Supreme Court that there is a constitutional limit to punitive damages in tort cases. By placing seven of the eight cases in the hands of veterans such as Mayer Brown's Andrew Frey, Theodore Olson of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, and Sidley Austin's Carter Phillips, business groups were able to make slow but steady progress -- culminating in last term's Philip Morris v. Williams. In some ways, Lazarus says, the long march toward a favorable outcome on punitive damages mirrored the late Thurgood Marshall's strategic litigation campaign before he became a justice, leading to a civil rights victory in Brown v. Board of Education.
Percentage of Expert Advocates Arguing Before Supreme Court
October Term Percentage of first-time advocates arguing before Court Percentage of advocates with 10 or more prior arguments
1980 76% 3%
2000 62% 9%
2006 52% 26%
Source: Richard Lazarus, Georgetown University Law Center
Note: Chart excludes lawyers from Solicitor General's Office.
The Court's renewed interest in antitrust issues also illustrates the elite bar's power to achieve success, says Lazarus, "not simply by discerning the priorities and interests of the justices but by changing them." The Court heard only two antitrust cases between 1992 and 2002, but since then it has decided 10. All 10 were brought by antitrust defendants appealing unfavorable decisions below, and all 10 were represented by seasoned veterans.
But the dominance of the Supreme Court Bar begins at the petition stage. The Court accepts fewer than 100 of the nearly 10,000 petitions it receives yearly. Yet the veterans, who know how to make a petition attractive to the justices and their clerks, sometimes achieve a 20 percent success rate or higher, Lazarus says -- something that would have been unheard of 20 years ago. In its first year of existence, for example, Goldstein's Stanford Law School clinic worked on four petitions -- and all four were granted.
Given the Court's shrunken docket, the veteran advocates are also busy writing amicus briefs, which, Lazarus documents, have grown in importance at both the petition stage and the merits stage. The number of amicus briefs supporting a petition for review have increased 40 percent in the last 25 years, and petitions that are accompanied by these briefs have a significantly higher chance of being accepted. Once the case is granted, Lazarus calculates, an average of nine amicus briefs are filed in advance of oral argument, triple the number 20 years earlier.
TAKING NO PRISONERS
The apex of amicus brief influence came in the arguments in Grutter v. Bollinger, the landmark 2003 affirmative action case. Justices posed 19 questions about the brief filed by retired military officials supporting affirmative action. Several referred to it as the "Carter Phillips brief," even though the counsel of record was his Sidley Austin partner Virginia Seitz, herself a veteran of the Supreme Court Bar.
The dominance of the specialists is especially visible at oral argument, Lazarus' study indicates. Last term, 26 percent of the advocates who argued before the Court were veterans -- defined as having argued five cases themselves or coming from an organization that has argued 10 cases.
But it is also at oral argument where the veterans say they earn their fees. The intense barrage of high-level questions from justices is not for the faint of heart, Dellinger says. "You can't evade answering their questions," he says. "If you do, they will hunt you down. They take no prisoners."
David Frederick of Kellogg, Huber, Hansen, Todd, Evans & Figel says, "The specialization has arisen at least in part in response to the Court's uniquely vigorous questioning style, which makes a Supreme Court argument quite unlike an argument in any other court."
Lazarus' article recalls oral arguments on April 25, when Frederick and five other advocates stood before the Court to argue in three cases. Two of the lawyers had argued more than 45 cases each before the justices, and all but one had argued more than 20. The "rookie" had five under his belt. Frederick, arguing his 21st case, had also appeared the week before. Lazarus writes of that day, "The modern Supreme Court Bar had arrived."
Monday, October 22, 2007
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Nibbling away Freedom of Faith in India
Religious freedom in India 'shrinking' says Christian author
Feature ENI-07-0800
By Anto Akkara
Bangalore, India, 17 October (ENI)--Despite India remaining the world's most populous and vibrant democracy, freedom of religion is steadily on the decline, says John Dayal, a journalist-turned-Christian activist, who is now national president of the 1919-founded All India Catholic Union and secretary general of the All India Christian Council .
"Many of the rights have been systematically diluted over the years by governments, courts and fundamentalist forces," Dayal told Ecumenical News International in an interview on 13 October about his soon-to-be-released book on religious freedom in India.
"A Matter of Equity: Freedom of Faith in Secular India" is a critique of religious freedom in the country. Dayal says that this freedom, or lack of it, ranges from the steady dilution of constitutional guarantees to harsh treatment meted out to Christians and minorities in every corner of the country.
The book is a collection of articles Dayal wrote both as a journalist, and after he became outspoken on issues concerning India's Christian community.
In his writings, Dayal describes a steady upsurge in anti-Christian violence from the late 1990s, when the Hindu nationalist BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) emerged as a strong political force.
"Even before the BJP came up, religious freedom had been facing curbs both by the government and the judiciary," says Dayal, who lists several documents in his book to support his claim.
He points out that the first anti-conversion bill, which restricts people converting to Christianity was introduced by the avowedly secular Congress party in the 1960s. The BJP, This, Dayal asserts, now emulates this legislation.
He adds that Christians enjoyed "better religious freedom three decades ago
than now," and notes that often lower courts in several areas have been "hostile to Christian grievances where they get little relief".
While India stopped allowing missionaries to enter the country decades ago, Dayal notes that, "Christian missionaries who have done exemplary service to the nation have been unceremoniously packed off by the government denying them visa extensions on one pretext or other."
Apart from that, the author says that the State machinery has been used to harass Christians and their institutions, even by secular governments.
"In this context, one will wonder what is the meaning of the religious freedom spelt out under fundamental freedom in our constitution," Dayal adds.
"But, what we (Christians) have faced from 1990s has capped it all," argues Dayal, who has visited almost every troubled spot in the country following attacks on Christians.
"A Matter of Equity" cites systematic and orchestrated attacks on Christian targets by Hindu fundamentalist forces that the author laments as being rooted in a "belief in violence".
Dayal says that during recent times India has recorded hundreds of incidents of deliberate violence against Christians, including the murders of priests, rapes of nuns, and brutal assaults on missionaries, besides attacks on Christian gatherings and buildings.
On the other hand, following the steady rise in atrocities, Dayal says, churches have also begun to speak up and come out on to the streets.
However, Dayal says that church leaders have failed to provide strong leadership for the 26 million Christians in India, or "to demand from the government what has been taken away over the decades".
:: A Matter of Equity: Freedom of Faith in Secular India, by John Dayal, is published by New Delhi-based Anamika Publishers and Distributors Pvt Ltd,500 pages, 800 Indian rupees. [565 words]
The book is available from catholicunion@gmail.com, postage free
Ecumenical News International
PO Box 2100 CH - 1211 Geneva 2 Switzerland
Feature ENI-07-0800
By Anto Akkara
Bangalore, India, 17 October (ENI)--Despite India remaining the world's most populous and vibrant democracy, freedom of religion is steadily on the decline, says John Dayal, a journalist-turned-Christian activist, who is now national president of the 1919-founded All India Catholic Union and secretary general of the All India Christian Council .
"Many of the rights have been systematically diluted over the years by governments, courts and fundamentalist forces," Dayal told Ecumenical News International in an interview on 13 October about his soon-to-be-released book on religious freedom in India.
"A Matter of Equity: Freedom of Faith in Secular India" is a critique of religious freedom in the country. Dayal says that this freedom, or lack of it, ranges from the steady dilution of constitutional guarantees to harsh treatment meted out to Christians and minorities in every corner of the country.
The book is a collection of articles Dayal wrote both as a journalist, and after he became outspoken on issues concerning India's Christian community.
In his writings, Dayal describes a steady upsurge in anti-Christian violence from the late 1990s, when the Hindu nationalist BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) emerged as a strong political force.
"Even before the BJP came up, religious freedom had been facing curbs both by the government and the judiciary," says Dayal, who lists several documents in his book to support his claim.
He points out that the first anti-conversion bill, which restricts people converting to Christianity was introduced by the avowedly secular Congress party in the 1960s. The BJP, This, Dayal asserts, now emulates this legislation.
He adds that Christians enjoyed "better religious freedom three decades ago
than now," and notes that often lower courts in several areas have been "hostile to Christian grievances where they get little relief".
While India stopped allowing missionaries to enter the country decades ago, Dayal notes that, "Christian missionaries who have done exemplary service to the nation have been unceremoniously packed off by the government denying them visa extensions on one pretext or other."
Apart from that, the author says that the State machinery has been used to harass Christians and their institutions, even by secular governments.
"In this context, one will wonder what is the meaning of the religious freedom spelt out under fundamental freedom in our constitution," Dayal adds.
"But, what we (Christians) have faced from 1990s has capped it all," argues Dayal, who has visited almost every troubled spot in the country following attacks on Christians.
"A Matter of Equity" cites systematic and orchestrated attacks on Christian targets by Hindu fundamentalist forces that the author laments as being rooted in a "belief in violence".
Dayal says that during recent times India has recorded hundreds of incidents of deliberate violence against Christians, including the murders of priests, rapes of nuns, and brutal assaults on missionaries, besides attacks on Christian gatherings and buildings.
On the other hand, following the steady rise in atrocities, Dayal says, churches have also begun to speak up and come out on to the streets.
However, Dayal says that church leaders have failed to provide strong leadership for the 26 million Christians in India, or "to demand from the government what has been taken away over the decades".
:: A Matter of Equity: Freedom of Faith in Secular India, by John Dayal, is published by New Delhi-based Anamika Publishers and Distributors Pvt Ltd,500 pages, 800 Indian rupees. [565 words]
The book is available from catholicunion@gmail.com, postage free
Ecumenical News International
PO Box 2100 CH - 1211 Geneva 2 Switzerland
Saturday, October 6, 2007
It is time to challenge Himachal Government in High court
Chhattisgarh Governor holds back anti conversion bill and seeks top legal advice, but Himachal makes it law
Christians decide it is time to challenge Himachal Government in High court
[JOHN DAYAL’S NOTE: NEW DELHI 6TH October 2007: This has been a momentous, if negative, week in the history of Freedom of Faith in India. In the dock are both the Bharatiya Janata party, ideologically aggressively opposed the presence of Christianity and Islam on the soil of India, and the Congress party, sworn to a secular political thesis but easy prey to competitive Hindu fundamentalist arguments as it seeks to retain its century-old political supremacy in India. The Congress government in Himachal Pradesh, the Himalayan State, has at last formulated the bureaucratic rules which will allow Police and Civil officers to monitor conversions to Christianity, and other faiths, in the province, and punish pastors with prison terms and massive fines. I have been waiting for these rules to be formulated ever since the laws were passed by the legislature and then affirmed by the State Governor many months ago, Though the Governor had given his assent, we could not move the Himachal High court as it would have been premature. In Gujarat in similar circumstances, we failed to get a response from the High Court which reminded us Legislative Acts could be challenged only after appropriate rules were put on the Statutes. Our first step now is to move under the Right ton Information to ask the State government the number of actual cases of fraudulent and forcible conversion to Christianity it has recorded in past years to justify its claim that such harsh laws had become necessary in a State where minority communities are barely visible in census figures. In Chhattisgarh, carved out of Madhya Pradesh [both are currently ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party], the Congress-appointed Governor however has resisted the administration’s efforts to sharpen an existing similar law. The Governor has sought the opinion of Union law officers in New Delhi on the constitutionality of the law. The present Vice President of India, Mr Hamid Ansari, had in his earlier appointment as Chairman of the National Minorities Commission pilloried such laws as injuring Freedom of Faith and going against the national Constitution. The current President of India, Mrs Pratibha Patil, too had refused to sign a similar Bill when she was Governor of Rajasthan, another state ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party. Ironically, she will now have to give her decision on the same Bill. Union law officers, including the Solicitor General of India, have made it clear that in their opinion such laws are an anathema to the secular credentials of the Constitution of India. It remains to be seen how the Himachal High Court will rule. We are seeking the assistance of the best legal brains in this cause. I give below reportage and texts of the latest move in Himachal Pradesh and the advice of the Solicitor General of India. Goolam E Vahanvati to the Madhya Pradesh government’s so called Freedom of Religion Bill which adds to the original Act passed some decades ago.]
In Raipur, Chhattisgarh governor E S L Narasimhan has referred the BJP state government's anti-conversion Bill to attorney-general of India Milon Banerjee for legal opinion. Official sources said the governor has sought clarifications from Banerjee on certain provisions of the Bill. Legislative affairs minister Ajay Chandrakar confirmed that the Chhattisgarh Religious Freedom (Amendment) Bill, which was passed by the state Assembly in mid-2006, is yet to receive the governor's assent. "However, I won't be able to specify the nature of clarification sought by the governor," he said. When contacted for an explanation about the governor's action, secretary to the governor PC Dalai neither confirmed nor denied the development. The Bill has a provision of "penalising those who change their faith without informing concerned authorities".
The clarification sought by the governor relates to the provision that would make reconversion simple. According to the draft Bill, a person born to parents who had changed their faith could convert to their original faith or that of his or her forefathers without any hindrance. It would not be considered conversion. The governor's decision assumes significance as Chhattisgarh is preparing for polls in 2008. "The delay in getting gubernatorial assent has put the BJP government in a spot," a source said. The Bill has been pending for more than a year as even Narasimhan's predecessor K M Seth had denied assent.
According to the Bill, people wishing to change religion must inform the district magistrate a month in advance. The penalty for those violating the law, including those who convert people forcibly, could be between Rs 50,000 and a Rs 1 lakh with imprisonment of up to five years.
Former Rajasthan governor Pratibha Patil, too, had referred the Bill to then president APJ Abdul Kalam.
In the Case of Madhya Pradesh, the Solicitor General of India faulted the state’s Freedom of Religion Bill.
The following is the text of the Solicitor General’s note:
OFFICE OF SHRI G E VAHANVATI SOLICITOR GENERAL OF INDIA, SUPREME COURT, NEW DELHI 110 001
Dy. No. 1166/07 dated 3/5/07, Deptt. of Legal Affairs
I have gone through the letter of His Excellency, the Governor dated 16 April 2007. Before dealing with questions which have been raised, it is necessary to note the relevant provisions.
Section 5 of the M.P. Dharma Swatamtraya Adhiniyam 1968 before its amendment read as follows:
“5. Information to be given to District Magistrate with respect to conversion:- (1) Whoever converts any person from one religion faith to another either by performing himself the ceremony necessary for such conversion as a religious priest or by taking’ part directly or indirectly in such ceremony as may be prescribed, send an intimation to the District Magistrate of the district in which the ceremony has taken place of the fact of such conversion in such form as may be prescribed.
(2) If any person fails with sufficient cause to comply with the provision contained in sub-section (1), he shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to one year or with fine which may extend to one thousand rupees or with both,”
By virtue of the proposed amendment to Section 5, the original section 5 is proposed to be substituted by a new Section 5 which reads as follows:
“5(1) Any person intending to convert his religion, shall give a declaration before the District Magistrate or before ,an Executive Magistrate specially authorized by the District Magistrate of the concerned District, prior to such conversion to the effect that he intends to convert his religion on his own will.
(2) The concerned religious priest, who intends to convert any person from one religious faith to another, either by performing himself the ceremony necessary for such conversion or by taking part directly or indirectly in such ceremony, shall intimate the date, time and place of the ceremony in which conversion shall be made along with the name and address of the person to be converted, to the concerned District Magistrate one month prior to the date of said ceremony, and the intimation shall be in such form and shall be delivered or caused to be delivered by the priest to the concerned District Magistrate in such manner as may be prescribed.
(3) On receiving the intimation under sub-section (1) and,(2) the District Magistrate shall inform the details of proposed conversion to the concerned Superintendent of Police, who shall ascertain through the office-in-charge of the concerned police station regarding the objection, in any, to the proposed conversion by local inquiry and intimate the same to the District Magistrate.
(4) Whoever fails to comply with the provision contained in sub-section (1) shall be punishable with fine which may extend to one thousand rupees.
Whoever fails to comply with the provision of sub-section (2) shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to one year or with fine which may extend to five thousand rupees or both.”
The following changes may be highlighted:
Under the existing provisions the obligation to furnish an intimation is cast on the person performing the conversion ceremony. Now, it would be on both- the person who wants to convert and the person performing the ceremony.
Sub section (2) casts an obligation on the person performing the ceremony to defer it by a month since prior intimation of one month is required to be given. This is not there in the existing provisions.
Under Sub section (3), the District Magistrate has to inform the details of the proposed conversion to the SP who is required to ascertain, through the officer-in-charge of the concerned police station “regarding the objections, if any, to the proposed conversion.”
No provision is made for the consequences of an adverse report.
Sub section 3 creates a serious problem. On receiving the intimation under sub-section(1)&(2), the District Magistrate is required to inform the details of the proposed conversion to the concerned Superintendent of Police, who is to ascertain through the officer-in-charge of the concerned police station regarding objections, if any to the proposed conversion by local enquiry. Sub section 3 is not happily worded at all. The enquiry is supposed to be with regard to objections if any to the proposed conversion, but it is not even required to enquire whether the conversion is forcible or not. If somebody merely objects to the proposed conversion, does that make it forcible?
The second problem is that if anybody objects to the conversion, it could result in an adverse report. A mere objection leads to an adverse report irrespective of whether it is forcible or mot. A conversion may be purely voluntary but any objection can lead to an adverse report.
I do not agree with the view that a Superintendent of Police may report that the conversion is “forcible or note of its own free will.” This is not what the proposed Sub section 5(3) requires to report. The superintendent of police is required to report any objections to the proposed conversion. Such a provision is not only vague but also unreasonable since it does not focus on the real issue, namely whether the conversion is forcible or not.
Looked at from another point of view, the assumption is that if a Superintendent of Police were to give a favourable report, then there is no problem. But if the Superintendent of police records that there are objections then what happens? Do the persons go ahead? The proposed Section 5 does not provide for this contingency at all. If the proposed Section 5 had clearly stated that notwithstanding the adverse report of the Superintendent of police, the conversion can still take place, then the effect of that would be that the person converting could do so and face prosecution under Section 4. The failure to clearly provide for the consequences of any adverse report and the failure to clarify that this would not stand in the way of a conversion would have the inevitable effect of deterring the concerned person from going ahead with the conversion, which will in turn violate article 25 of the Constitution.
I also do not agree with the view that the person would have to challenge the report by way of Writ Proceedings under Article 226 or 227 of the Constitution. Does this mean that till the report (merely based on a solitary objection) is set aside and quashed, the conversion cannot take place? If so, it is unreasonable as this would have nothing to do with “public order.”
In my opinion, lack of clarity and uncertainty in the proposed legislation is bound to lead to confusion which can have the effect of curtailing the right under article 25 in an unreasonable manner.
In my opinion, the judgment of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the said judgment was concerned with the unamended Act. The Hon’ble Court had upheld the validity of the Act on the ground of public order. In paragraph 23 of the judgment, the Hon’ble Court observed:
“The Acts therefore clearly provide for the maintenance of public order for it forcible conversion had not been prohibited, that would have created public disorder.”
The Hon’ble Court in the Stanislaus case was not concerned with an “adverse report” and the effects there of on the fundamental right under Article 25. In the instant case, Section 5(3) would act as an unreasonable fetter to the fundamental right under Article 25. The proposed Section 5(3) is open ended. The said sub-section talks of objections if any an adverse report could be made on the basis of objections which are unrelated to prohibition of forced conversion which is the objective of the Act. In my opinion, the said Sub section 3 cannot be said to be a valid restriction on the ground of public order.
In the premises, I will answer the queries as under.
Q. (i) Whether proposed amendment in Section 5(1) to 5(5) of the M.P. Dharm Swatantraya Adhiniyam 1968 are ultra- vires to Article 24(1), 26 and 2(3) of the Constitution of India?
Ans. Yes, for the carious reasons mentioned above, pointing out lack of clarity and patent obscurity in Section 5(2) and 5(3) of the proposed amendment.
Q.(ii) If the person intending to convert his religion declares before the District Magistrate and if the report of Superintendent of Police is negative, then what legal remedy will be available to the person against whom the District Magistrate may take action? The Bill is silent on the aspect.
&
Q.(iii) If the Religious priest intimates about the conversion before one month to the District Magistrate and if the report of Superintendent of Police is negative, then what legal remedy will be available to the person (Priest) against whom the District Magistrate may take action? The Bill is silent on this aspect.
Ans. In my opinion, it is highly unreasonable to expect a person against whom a report is negative to be required to challenge the report. The implication of such an approach is that until the report is set aside by a competent court, the conversion cannot take place. That by itself amounts to unreasonable restriction under article 25.
Q.(iv) There is an ambiguity in sub section (3) of Section 5 of the Bill. It is not clear as to what order or action will be made or taken by the District Magistrate on receiving an intimation or report from the Superintendent of Police, if a flaw is found in the alleged process of conversion. This also needs to be scrutinized.
Ans. There is clear ambiguity in the proposed sub section 5(3). I have indicated the implications hereinabove. It is unreasonable to bring about a nebulous situation leading to deterring a person from going through and exercising his right to convert on the basis of a negative report based on extraneous factors such as “ objections” to the conversion. The failure to provide clearly as to what is to happen in the case of an adverse report renders the proposed clause unreasonable. The wording of Sub section 3 which refers to objections ( and not to forcible conversion) is contrary to the spirit of the Act. It would be quite strange that if somebody objects to a conversion then that would be treated as the conversion being forcible.
Goolam E Vahanvati, Solicitor General of India
III. Vice President Hamid Ansari while he was chairman of the National Minorities Commission had also Congress party chief minister Virbhadra Singh's anti-conversion law in Himachal Pradesh.
The freedom of Religion Act, 2006 enacted by the Legislative Assembly of Himachal Pradesh, received the assent of the Governor on February 18, 2007.
The National Commission for Minorities has examined the provisions of the Act and the Statement of Objects and Reasons. The latter refers to "rise in conversions based on allurement generally" and to " a persistent demand from across the different strata of the society, urging the State Government to curb it" as, otherwise, it may "erode the confidence and mutual trust between the different religious and ethnic groups in the State".
According to the 2001 Census, religious minorities constitute 4.53 percent of the total population of Himachal Pradesh. Of these, Muslims account for 1.97%, Sikhs 1.19%, Buddhists 1.25% , and Christians 0.13%. Media reports relating to the adoption of the Act suggest conversions by "force" to Christianity as the prime motivation for the new law. No specific data on such conversions, however, has been cited officially or in media reports.
The commission has noted with concern the terminology used in the Act and the methodology prescribed for implementing it. The definition of "force" includes "threat of divine displeasure" and " Social excommunication"; neither of these is considered an offence in the Indian legal system.
The Act prescribes that a person intending to convert from one religion to another must give a notice of at least thirty days to the District Magistrate who then "shall get the matter enquired into by such agency as he may deem fit". No time limit is prescribed for the conduct of such an enquiry nor have its modalities been defined. The failure to give such a notice, on the part of the person intending to convert, would be punishable by a fine. No such notice however is required if a person reverts back to his "original religion".
Since provisions of existing law already cover cases in which fraud or force are involved, the specific rationale cited for the enactment is not understood. On the contrary, the provision of notice and enquiry, and that too selectively, is tantamount to a gross interference with the individual liberties of citizens and would allow state functionaries to interfere in matter of personal life and religious beliefs. More seriously, it would impinge on the freedom of conscience, and free profession, practice and propagation of religion guaranteed by Article 25 of the Constitution.
In view of these considerations, the National Commission for Minorities expresses its profound concern over the attempt in this Act, and reportedly by similar pieces of legislation contemplated in some others States, to interfere with the basic right of freedom of religion that is the birth right of every Indian. It appeals to the Central and State Governments, civil society groups and individual citizens to recognize the existence of such trends and take timely steps to reverse them.
Christians decide it is time to challenge Himachal Government in High court
[JOHN DAYAL’S NOTE: NEW DELHI 6TH October 2007: This has been a momentous, if negative, week in the history of Freedom of Faith in India. In the dock are both the Bharatiya Janata party, ideologically aggressively opposed the presence of Christianity and Islam on the soil of India, and the Congress party, sworn to a secular political thesis but easy prey to competitive Hindu fundamentalist arguments as it seeks to retain its century-old political supremacy in India. The Congress government in Himachal Pradesh, the Himalayan State, has at last formulated the bureaucratic rules which will allow Police and Civil officers to monitor conversions to Christianity, and other faiths, in the province, and punish pastors with prison terms and massive fines. I have been waiting for these rules to be formulated ever since the laws were passed by the legislature and then affirmed by the State Governor many months ago, Though the Governor had given his assent, we could not move the Himachal High court as it would have been premature. In Gujarat in similar circumstances, we failed to get a response from the High Court which reminded us Legislative Acts could be challenged only after appropriate rules were put on the Statutes. Our first step now is to move under the Right ton Information to ask the State government the number of actual cases of fraudulent and forcible conversion to Christianity it has recorded in past years to justify its claim that such harsh laws had become necessary in a State where minority communities are barely visible in census figures. In Chhattisgarh, carved out of Madhya Pradesh [both are currently ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party], the Congress-appointed Governor however has resisted the administration’s efforts to sharpen an existing similar law. The Governor has sought the opinion of Union law officers in New Delhi on the constitutionality of the law. The present Vice President of India, Mr Hamid Ansari, had in his earlier appointment as Chairman of the National Minorities Commission pilloried such laws as injuring Freedom of Faith and going against the national Constitution. The current President of India, Mrs Pratibha Patil, too had refused to sign a similar Bill when she was Governor of Rajasthan, another state ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party. Ironically, she will now have to give her decision on the same Bill. Union law officers, including the Solicitor General of India, have made it clear that in their opinion such laws are an anathema to the secular credentials of the Constitution of India. It remains to be seen how the Himachal High Court will rule. We are seeking the assistance of the best legal brains in this cause. I give below reportage and texts of the latest move in Himachal Pradesh and the advice of the Solicitor General of India. Goolam E Vahanvati to the Madhya Pradesh government’s so called Freedom of Religion Bill which adds to the original Act passed some decades ago.]
In Raipur, Chhattisgarh governor E S L Narasimhan has referred the BJP state government's anti-conversion Bill to attorney-general of India Milon Banerjee for legal opinion. Official sources said the governor has sought clarifications from Banerjee on certain provisions of the Bill. Legislative affairs minister Ajay Chandrakar confirmed that the Chhattisgarh Religious Freedom (Amendment) Bill, which was passed by the state Assembly in mid-2006, is yet to receive the governor's assent. "However, I won't be able to specify the nature of clarification sought by the governor," he said. When contacted for an explanation about the governor's action, secretary to the governor PC Dalai neither confirmed nor denied the development. The Bill has a provision of "penalising those who change their faith without informing concerned authorities".
The clarification sought by the governor relates to the provision that would make reconversion simple. According to the draft Bill, a person born to parents who had changed their faith could convert to their original faith or that of his or her forefathers without any hindrance. It would not be considered conversion. The governor's decision assumes significance as Chhattisgarh is preparing for polls in 2008. "The delay in getting gubernatorial assent has put the BJP government in a spot," a source said. The Bill has been pending for more than a year as even Narasimhan's predecessor K M Seth had denied assent.
According to the Bill, people wishing to change religion must inform the district magistrate a month in advance. The penalty for those violating the law, including those who convert people forcibly, could be between Rs 50,000 and a Rs 1 lakh with imprisonment of up to five years.
Former Rajasthan governor Pratibha Patil, too, had referred the Bill to then president APJ Abdul Kalam.
In the Case of Madhya Pradesh, the Solicitor General of India faulted the state’s Freedom of Religion Bill.
The following is the text of the Solicitor General’s note:
OFFICE OF SHRI G E VAHANVATI SOLICITOR GENERAL OF INDIA, SUPREME COURT, NEW DELHI 110 001
Dy. No. 1166/07 dated 3/5/07, Deptt. of Legal Affairs
I have gone through the letter of His Excellency, the Governor dated 16 April 2007. Before dealing with questions which have been raised, it is necessary to note the relevant provisions.
Section 5 of the M.P. Dharma Swatamtraya Adhiniyam 1968 before its amendment read as follows:
“5. Information to be given to District Magistrate with respect to conversion:- (1) Whoever converts any person from one religion faith to another either by performing himself the ceremony necessary for such conversion as a religious priest or by taking’ part directly or indirectly in such ceremony as may be prescribed, send an intimation to the District Magistrate of the district in which the ceremony has taken place of the fact of such conversion in such form as may be prescribed.
(2) If any person fails with sufficient cause to comply with the provision contained in sub-section (1), he shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to one year or with fine which may extend to one thousand rupees or with both,”
By virtue of the proposed amendment to Section 5, the original section 5 is proposed to be substituted by a new Section 5 which reads as follows:
“5(1) Any person intending to convert his religion, shall give a declaration before the District Magistrate or before ,an Executive Magistrate specially authorized by the District Magistrate of the concerned District, prior to such conversion to the effect that he intends to convert his religion on his own will.
(2) The concerned religious priest, who intends to convert any person from one religious faith to another, either by performing himself the ceremony necessary for such conversion or by taking part directly or indirectly in such ceremony, shall intimate the date, time and place of the ceremony in which conversion shall be made along with the name and address of the person to be converted, to the concerned District Magistrate one month prior to the date of said ceremony, and the intimation shall be in such form and shall be delivered or caused to be delivered by the priest to the concerned District Magistrate in such manner as may be prescribed.
(3) On receiving the intimation under sub-section (1) and,(2) the District Magistrate shall inform the details of proposed conversion to the concerned Superintendent of Police, who shall ascertain through the office-in-charge of the concerned police station regarding the objection, in any, to the proposed conversion by local inquiry and intimate the same to the District Magistrate.
(4) Whoever fails to comply with the provision contained in sub-section (1) shall be punishable with fine which may extend to one thousand rupees.
Whoever fails to comply with the provision of sub-section (2) shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to one year or with fine which may extend to five thousand rupees or both.”
The following changes may be highlighted:
Under the existing provisions the obligation to furnish an intimation is cast on the person performing the conversion ceremony. Now, it would be on both- the person who wants to convert and the person performing the ceremony.
Sub section (2) casts an obligation on the person performing the ceremony to defer it by a month since prior intimation of one month is required to be given. This is not there in the existing provisions.
Under Sub section (3), the District Magistrate has to inform the details of the proposed conversion to the SP who is required to ascertain, through the officer-in-charge of the concerned police station “regarding the objections, if any, to the proposed conversion.”
No provision is made for the consequences of an adverse report.
Sub section 3 creates a serious problem. On receiving the intimation under sub-section(1)&(2), the District Magistrate is required to inform the details of the proposed conversion to the concerned Superintendent of Police, who is to ascertain through the officer-in-charge of the concerned police station regarding objections, if any to the proposed conversion by local enquiry. Sub section 3 is not happily worded at all. The enquiry is supposed to be with regard to objections if any to the proposed conversion, but it is not even required to enquire whether the conversion is forcible or not. If somebody merely objects to the proposed conversion, does that make it forcible?
The second problem is that if anybody objects to the conversion, it could result in an adverse report. A mere objection leads to an adverse report irrespective of whether it is forcible or mot. A conversion may be purely voluntary but any objection can lead to an adverse report.
I do not agree with the view that a Superintendent of Police may report that the conversion is “forcible or note of its own free will.” This is not what the proposed Sub section 5(3) requires to report. The superintendent of police is required to report any objections to the proposed conversion. Such a provision is not only vague but also unreasonable since it does not focus on the real issue, namely whether the conversion is forcible or not.
Looked at from another point of view, the assumption is that if a Superintendent of Police were to give a favourable report, then there is no problem. But if the Superintendent of police records that there are objections then what happens? Do the persons go ahead? The proposed Section 5 does not provide for this contingency at all. If the proposed Section 5 had clearly stated that notwithstanding the adverse report of the Superintendent of police, the conversion can still take place, then the effect of that would be that the person converting could do so and face prosecution under Section 4. The failure to clearly provide for the consequences of any adverse report and the failure to clarify that this would not stand in the way of a conversion would have the inevitable effect of deterring the concerned person from going ahead with the conversion, which will in turn violate article 25 of the Constitution.
I also do not agree with the view that the person would have to challenge the report by way of Writ Proceedings under Article 226 or 227 of the Constitution. Does this mean that till the report (merely based on a solitary objection) is set aside and quashed, the conversion cannot take place? If so, it is unreasonable as this would have nothing to do with “public order.”
In my opinion, lack of clarity and uncertainty in the proposed legislation is bound to lead to confusion which can have the effect of curtailing the right under article 25 in an unreasonable manner.
In my opinion, the judgment of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in the said judgment was concerned with the unamended Act. The Hon’ble Court had upheld the validity of the Act on the ground of public order. In paragraph 23 of the judgment, the Hon’ble Court observed:
“The Acts therefore clearly provide for the maintenance of public order for it forcible conversion had not been prohibited, that would have created public disorder.”
The Hon’ble Court in the Stanislaus case was not concerned with an “adverse report” and the effects there of on the fundamental right under Article 25. In the instant case, Section 5(3) would act as an unreasonable fetter to the fundamental right under Article 25. The proposed Section 5(3) is open ended. The said sub-section talks of objections if any an adverse report could be made on the basis of objections which are unrelated to prohibition of forced conversion which is the objective of the Act. In my opinion, the said Sub section 3 cannot be said to be a valid restriction on the ground of public order.
In the premises, I will answer the queries as under.
Q. (i) Whether proposed amendment in Section 5(1) to 5(5) of the M.P. Dharm Swatantraya Adhiniyam 1968 are ultra- vires to Article 24(1), 26 and 2(3) of the Constitution of India?
Ans. Yes, for the carious reasons mentioned above, pointing out lack of clarity and patent obscurity in Section 5(2) and 5(3) of the proposed amendment.
Q.(ii) If the person intending to convert his religion declares before the District Magistrate and if the report of Superintendent of Police is negative, then what legal remedy will be available to the person against whom the District Magistrate may take action? The Bill is silent on the aspect.
&
Q.(iii) If the Religious priest intimates about the conversion before one month to the District Magistrate and if the report of Superintendent of Police is negative, then what legal remedy will be available to the person (Priest) against whom the District Magistrate may take action? The Bill is silent on this aspect.
Ans. In my opinion, it is highly unreasonable to expect a person against whom a report is negative to be required to challenge the report. The implication of such an approach is that until the report is set aside by a competent court, the conversion cannot take place. That by itself amounts to unreasonable restriction under article 25.
Q.(iv) There is an ambiguity in sub section (3) of Section 5 of the Bill. It is not clear as to what order or action will be made or taken by the District Magistrate on receiving an intimation or report from the Superintendent of Police, if a flaw is found in the alleged process of conversion. This also needs to be scrutinized.
Ans. There is clear ambiguity in the proposed sub section 5(3). I have indicated the implications hereinabove. It is unreasonable to bring about a nebulous situation leading to deterring a person from going through and exercising his right to convert on the basis of a negative report based on extraneous factors such as “ objections” to the conversion. The failure to provide clearly as to what is to happen in the case of an adverse report renders the proposed clause unreasonable. The wording of Sub section 3 which refers to objections ( and not to forcible conversion) is contrary to the spirit of the Act. It would be quite strange that if somebody objects to a conversion then that would be treated as the conversion being forcible.
Goolam E Vahanvati, Solicitor General of India
III. Vice President Hamid Ansari while he was chairman of the National Minorities Commission had also Congress party chief minister Virbhadra Singh's anti-conversion law in Himachal Pradesh.
The freedom of Religion Act, 2006 enacted by the Legislative Assembly of Himachal Pradesh, received the assent of the Governor on February 18, 2007.
The National Commission for Minorities has examined the provisions of the Act and the Statement of Objects and Reasons. The latter refers to "rise in conversions based on allurement generally" and to " a persistent demand from across the different strata of the society, urging the State Government to curb it" as, otherwise, it may "erode the confidence and mutual trust between the different religious and ethnic groups in the State".
According to the 2001 Census, religious minorities constitute 4.53 percent of the total population of Himachal Pradesh. Of these, Muslims account for 1.97%, Sikhs 1.19%, Buddhists 1.25% , and Christians 0.13%. Media reports relating to the adoption of the Act suggest conversions by "force" to Christianity as the prime motivation for the new law. No specific data on such conversions, however, has been cited officially or in media reports.
The commission has noted with concern the terminology used in the Act and the methodology prescribed for implementing it. The definition of "force" includes "threat of divine displeasure" and " Social excommunication"; neither of these is considered an offence in the Indian legal system.
The Act prescribes that a person intending to convert from one religion to another must give a notice of at least thirty days to the District Magistrate who then "shall get the matter enquired into by such agency as he may deem fit". No time limit is prescribed for the conduct of such an enquiry nor have its modalities been defined. The failure to give such a notice, on the part of the person intending to convert, would be punishable by a fine. No such notice however is required if a person reverts back to his "original religion".
Since provisions of existing law already cover cases in which fraud or force are involved, the specific rationale cited for the enactment is not understood. On the contrary, the provision of notice and enquiry, and that too selectively, is tantamount to a gross interference with the individual liberties of citizens and would allow state functionaries to interfere in matter of personal life and religious beliefs. More seriously, it would impinge on the freedom of conscience, and free profession, practice and propagation of religion guaranteed by Article 25 of the Constitution.
In view of these considerations, the National Commission for Minorities expresses its profound concern over the attempt in this Act, and reportedly by similar pieces of legislation contemplated in some others States, to interfere with the basic right of freedom of religion that is the birth right of every Indian. It appeals to the Central and State Governments, civil society groups and individual citizens to recognize the existence of such trends and take timely steps to reverse them.
Monday, October 1, 2007
Indian Government's subsidy to Religion
[This is published in The bHimal newsmagazine, Kathmandu, this week.Financing faith ]
While there is a lot of talk about the Indian government dismissing the Constitution in order to support some Muslim institutions and rituals, little is said of state support for Hinduism.
By : John Dayal
bilash rai
Do not expect graphs or charts in this article: it covers the Indian government’s spending on religion and related infrastructure, a topic that has long been a closely guarded secret, even within the halls of Parliament. Pertinent information only leaks out when some smart member of the national or state legislature strikes it lucky. One such incident took place last year in the Rajya Sabha, when Minister of State for Human Resource Development D Purandeswari, in a written reply to Andhra Pradesh representative C Ramachandraiah, stated: “The state government of Andhra Pradesh has submitted a proposal for financial assistance of Rs 243.27 lakhs for modernization of madarsas.” This was meant without any irony, even though newspapers were simultaneously reporting a Lok Sabha answer that the union government was seriously considering the enactment of new legislation to check the receipt and utilisation of foreign funds by madrassas and other organisations.
Religion is a touchy subject in India, and the interface of government and religion even more so. Most political parties, including the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), often come dangerously close to being disqualified from parliamentary politics by the vigilant Election Commission for dabbling in the spiritual with an eye on the electorate and the next elections. To be fair, the Constitution does force on the government an entirely Western concept of the secular state, with religion completely divorced from governance and the instruments of state. Yet tradition and culture nonetheless compel the state players to devise radically new definitions of secularism – from the Nehruvian ‘Equal distance from every religion’, to the BJP’s ‘Equal respect for every religion’. But in this, Hinduism still remains the native, the ‘default’, form. The ‘non-Indic’ – a new term evolved by academics loyal to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) – faiths are ultimately tolerated only as minority panths, or denominations, rather than as separate religions.
The New Delhi government has been challenged repeatedly to state its attitude towards religion – or worse, to take sides in religious wars in the name of communal violence. The controversy surrounding the Babri Masjid is just one such dispute. The latest is the Ram Sethu controversy, where the government’s maritime dream to have a sea channel linking the Bombay and Cochin ports with Madras through Adam’s Bridge, thereby cutting 30 hours out of the shipping time, has long been stymied by Hindu devotees. Top scientists have been dragged into the fray, and by mid-September, the government found itself in the unenviable position of having to tell the Supreme Court that there has been no evidence of Ram, the bridge or Ravan. But roadblocks in various cities, and accusations levelled at Sonia Gandhi’s United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government for “insulting Hindu sentiment”, had the UPA do a quick about-face, and state that “the existence of Ram cannot be doubted”.
Not that other religions have not similarly charged the government with bias. Christians are angry that New Delhi has given Hindu Dalits privileges denied to Christians converted from the same caste. Sikhs, meanwhile, are still nursing wounds from their last encounter with the Indian state, in 1984. Buddhists are fighting for an identity, and Jains are struggling just to establish that they exist separate from Hinduism. Such is life, but it is made more complicated by various maverick judges. For instance, Justice K Srivastava of the Allahabad High Court, on 10 September, just days before his retirement, ruled that Muslims were not to be treated as a minority with special rights, and that the Bhagwad Gita should be regarded as the national holy book.
Muslim monies
If the relationship between religion and state is a shrouded issue in India today, the formal financing of all things religious from the national coffers remains even more out of reach for information seekers. The one time that a bit of light can be shed on the matter is when the issue is raised regarding government subsidies for two items: Haj and madrassas. Indeed, the Indian spotlight remains on Islam, and that light is focused mainly by members of the Hindutva Parivar – in Parliament, in the courts, in academia and in the public discourse.
As D Purandeswari indicated in the Rajya Sabha questioning, the central government does pay for the upkeep of madrassas in most states, and Islamic teachers are paid out of public funds. In addition, there is a sizable subsidy (though the amount is not publicly known) for the propagation of the Urdu language. Most states have also made provisions for financing madrassas, particularly in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala.
Again, these figures are kept well shrouded, and exact amounts are almost impossible to come by. Data given in provisional budget speeches is in round figures, and most is said to remain unspent. As such, it is all but impossible to estimate exactly how much is spent each year by the central and state governments on madrassas and related scholarship, teachers’ salaries, books and Urdu-language promotion. Even if this figure runs into the billions of rupees, as charged by the Sangh Parivar, it could easily be explained as legitimate expenses for ‘human-resource development’.
The subsidy for Haj is a more complicated matter entirely. There is no equivalent of Haj in any other religion: the Hindu teeraths do not come close, and Christianity has nothing remotely similar. Even in Islam, Haj is obligatory only for those who are in sound health and can afford it. They cannot perform the pilgrimage on borrowed money, nor on the charity of others. There is likewise no mention of help from the state, other than facilitation.
Last year, one B N Shukla went to court against the Haj subsidy, demanding it be withdrawn. His plaint pointed out that the Constitution provides equal status to all Indians, while also restricting the government from giving benefits to one faith at the cost of others. Shukla did not site any official record, but alleged that every year the government spends more than INR 3 billion on more than 100,000 Hajjis. Special flights are run on the national carrier, Air India; air-conditioned Haj houses have been built across the country; and pilgrims are provided free food and lodging during the course of their trip. Even Islamic countries do not give subsidies for Haj, Shukla’s application noted. A notice was subsequently sent to the government, the official response to which was reiterated in its response to a question in Parliament.
The Haj subsidy was formally raised in the Parliamentary Standing Committee on External Affairs during P V Narasimha Rao’s government, following the demolition of the Babri Masjid in December 1992. All parties were represented in the Committee, and the recommendation to reduce and eventually abolish the subsidy was unanimous. Fourteen years later, in 2006, the government reported that 83,000 pilgrims performed the Haj during the previous year, out of which the government subsidised around INR 1.8 billion. For good measure, Parliament was told that 529 Hindu pilgrims performed the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra that same year, at a public cost of INR 17.2 million. Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma, who reported these figures, also said that 8179 people visited Sikh gurudwaras and Hindu temples in Pakistan the previous year. Both groups were given free medical assistance, security and various escorts.
For the RSS, the Haj-related data came at an opportune time. It reported a 500 percent increase in just seven years, which the RSS described as an “alarming, non-secular appeasement of one religious community when one considers that the Indian government is so desperate to reduce food grains and fertiliser subsidy to the large and poor farming community.”
Muslims and secular scholars alike point out that the Haj subsidy began during the early 1970s, after the oil crisis had caused Haj-related transportation prices to skyrocket. It was introduced as something of a stopgap measure – and the charge of official ‘appeasement’ of minorities has lingered ever since. The Haj charter fare was first fixed at INR 6000, before being eventually doubled. Of the 120,000 Indian Muslims who undertook the Mecca pilgrimage this year, some 70,000 went by air, and were able to avail themselves of a subsidy of more than INR 20,000 per person. (There is no subsidy for the 50,000 others who went by ship.) But former Member of Parliament Syed Shahabuddin points out that many Indian Muslim pilgrims come from rural areas, and are not even aware of the government subsidy. As such, much of this money is simply going to an elite group of Muslims, who would, one would assume, least need the taxpayer’s subsidy.
Islam in India further benefits from the public exchequer in the larger mosques, which receive government doles for salaries, annual upkeep and additional expenses. As elsewhere, however, very little information on these headings is public.
Mela monies
The situation with regards to Hinduism is even murkier. Despite the significant attention paid to the interface between the government and Islam, rarely are questions raised regarding government subsidies to Hindu and Sikh pilgrimages, in temple upkeep, in paying for the salaries of Hindu priests, and in maintaining public spaces during such events as the Maha and Ardha kumbhs. (Christians, meanwhile, claim that there is next to no money spent on them, other than by the Archaeological Survey of India on heritage buildings in Goa, or by the British government on graves for soldiers.)
As noted, Hindus do receive government subsidies for pilgrimages to Mount Kailash, and from a variety of sources. First, the Ministry of External Affairs routes INR 3250 to each Kailash yatri. The Uttar Pradesh state government then adds INR 5000 per pilgrim. The Delhi state government adds another INR 5000 for any pilgrim from Delhi. Likewise, the Gujarat government gives a kit worth INR 2500 to every yatri from that state. This kind of subsidy may well be given by other states as well, although such information is not publicly available.
Gujarat presents a particularly interesting case of state money being funnelled towards Hindu causes. The BJP government in 2001 announced that it would begin paying monthly salaries to Hindu priests in the state. During the first phase, each priest of the 354 government-controlled devasthans, or temples, would be entitled to a monthly salary of about INR 1200. The late Haren Pandya, at that time Minister of State for Home Affairs with the additional charge of “pilgrimage development and cow protection”, told the media that priests of other religions were paid from either the Waqf Board or trusts managing the place of worship. The new payments were “to give justice to the feelings of the Hindu society that salaries are being paid to them”, Pandya explained.
There is some information available on the tab for massive Hindu fairs, although much of this spending is merely labelled as ‘infrastructure development’. The grounds of the gargantuan 12-yearly Allahabad Maha Kumbh, for instance, are spread over 1500 hectares. During the last Kumbh Mela, in 2001, the site boasted 12,000 taps, capable of supplying 50.4 million litres of water; 450 kilometres of electric lines and 15,000 streetlights in place; 70,000 toilets; and 7100 sweepers to clean up the mess generated by an estimated five million devotees. There were also 11 post offices and 3000 temporary phone connections, while 4000 buses and five trains were also requisitioned for the mela period. At its peak, the mela administration had more than 80 officials working full time. The budget for all of this was INR 1.2 billion – INR 800 million from the state government, and INR 400 million from the Centre. This did not include the costs of deploying around 11,000 policemen, as well as 40 companies of the Provincial Armed Constabulary and other paramilitary forces.
The case of the Ujjain Ardha Kumbh, in Madhya Pradesh in April 2004, was no different. At that time, Chief Minister Uma Bharati promised that she would do all she could for the festival, which at the time was expecting millions of pilgrims. Bharati ultimately received additional funds from the Centre to the tune of INR 10 billion.
Melas and pilgrimages aside, the government does not reveal how much it costs to broadcast the gurubani from the Golden Temple in Amritsar, nor explain why some temples and church groups receive tax exemptions on commercial activities such as medical colleges, charging hundreds of thousands of rupees in capitation or admission charges.
Faithful monies
Hopefully, right-to-information exercises will soon help the public assess the full extent of direct, indirect and tertiary financing of the faith in India. Or will it?
The courts are themselves not insulated from dabbling or intervening in matters of faith. This is not merely to do with the photographs of Hindu deities in the reception rooms of the Supreme Court in New Delhi. Nor is it only to do with judges like Justice Srivastava and their obviously religious biases. Rather, this is a problem of systemic lack of separation between religion and the judiciary, as well as the other arms of the state, which only public vigilance can expose.
Yet keeping track of government and private funding of religion in India requires apparatus that even the Right to Information Bill seems incapable of offering – at least in its current avatar, in which government reasoning and official notes remain out of the public domain.
It was during the Emergency, in 1976, that Indira Gandhi brought forward the Foreign Contributions Regulation Act (FCRA). This was to keep an eye on – and, if possible, to prevent – the flow of alleged West European funds to the Gandhi Peace Foundation, as well as other organisations that supported the popular agitation led by Jayprakash Narayan. The FCRA has been used largely to scrutinise Christians priests and nuns, a few Muslim groups and secular NGOs who receive funding through official channels. Meanwhile, hawala dealers are able to evade FCRA checks with the same felicity that they avoid Home Ministry surveillance. Recent unofficial research has found that the foreign money coming to large Hindutva and Islamic groups by way of personal donations and hawala transactions runs into the tens of billions of dollars.
The indication of monies received comes only through the visible evidence of where the money has gone. There is a rash of temple-school complexes in about around 100,000 villages in central India and Gujarat that have not been financed through documented means. Meanwhile, the growth of mosques in the Tarai belt along the Nepali border is a visible red rag to Hindu activists. Exactly who pays for the massive rallies sponsored in pursuit of politico-religious agendas remains a question no one wants to answer. The lack of transparency contributes to the increase in fundamentalist activities of all hues, funded by money that enters the country through dubious means.
The question of whether a secular state should be allowed to finance religious activities at all is a part of the extensive debate as to how exactly to define ‘secularism’ in the Indian context. But that politicians in power are potentially able to utilise state funds to further the religious agendas espoused by their parties should surely be a matter of concern for democratic-rights activists and secular citizens alike.
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While there is a lot of talk about the Indian government dismissing the Constitution in order to support some Muslim institutions and rituals, little is said of state support for Hinduism.
By : John Dayal
bilash rai
Do not expect graphs or charts in this article: it covers the Indian government’s spending on religion and related infrastructure, a topic that has long been a closely guarded secret, even within the halls of Parliament. Pertinent information only leaks out when some smart member of the national or state legislature strikes it lucky. One such incident took place last year in the Rajya Sabha, when Minister of State for Human Resource Development D Purandeswari, in a written reply to Andhra Pradesh representative C Ramachandraiah, stated: “The state government of Andhra Pradesh has submitted a proposal for financial assistance of Rs 243.27 lakhs for modernization of madarsas.” This was meant without any irony, even though newspapers were simultaneously reporting a Lok Sabha answer that the union government was seriously considering the enactment of new legislation to check the receipt and utilisation of foreign funds by madrassas and other organisations.
Religion is a touchy subject in India, and the interface of government and religion even more so. Most political parties, including the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), often come dangerously close to being disqualified from parliamentary politics by the vigilant Election Commission for dabbling in the spiritual with an eye on the electorate and the next elections. To be fair, the Constitution does force on the government an entirely Western concept of the secular state, with religion completely divorced from governance and the instruments of state. Yet tradition and culture nonetheless compel the state players to devise radically new definitions of secularism – from the Nehruvian ‘Equal distance from every religion’, to the BJP’s ‘Equal respect for every religion’. But in this, Hinduism still remains the native, the ‘default’, form. The ‘non-Indic’ – a new term evolved by academics loyal to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) – faiths are ultimately tolerated only as minority panths, or denominations, rather than as separate religions.
The New Delhi government has been challenged repeatedly to state its attitude towards religion – or worse, to take sides in religious wars in the name of communal violence. The controversy surrounding the Babri Masjid is just one such dispute. The latest is the Ram Sethu controversy, where the government’s maritime dream to have a sea channel linking the Bombay and Cochin ports with Madras through Adam’s Bridge, thereby cutting 30 hours out of the shipping time, has long been stymied by Hindu devotees. Top scientists have been dragged into the fray, and by mid-September, the government found itself in the unenviable position of having to tell the Supreme Court that there has been no evidence of Ram, the bridge or Ravan. But roadblocks in various cities, and accusations levelled at Sonia Gandhi’s United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government for “insulting Hindu sentiment”, had the UPA do a quick about-face, and state that “the existence of Ram cannot be doubted”.
Not that other religions have not similarly charged the government with bias. Christians are angry that New Delhi has given Hindu Dalits privileges denied to Christians converted from the same caste. Sikhs, meanwhile, are still nursing wounds from their last encounter with the Indian state, in 1984. Buddhists are fighting for an identity, and Jains are struggling just to establish that they exist separate from Hinduism. Such is life, but it is made more complicated by various maverick judges. For instance, Justice K Srivastava of the Allahabad High Court, on 10 September, just days before his retirement, ruled that Muslims were not to be treated as a minority with special rights, and that the Bhagwad Gita should be regarded as the national holy book.
Muslim monies
If the relationship between religion and state is a shrouded issue in India today, the formal financing of all things religious from the national coffers remains even more out of reach for information seekers. The one time that a bit of light can be shed on the matter is when the issue is raised regarding government subsidies for two items: Haj and madrassas. Indeed, the Indian spotlight remains on Islam, and that light is focused mainly by members of the Hindutva Parivar – in Parliament, in the courts, in academia and in the public discourse.
As D Purandeswari indicated in the Rajya Sabha questioning, the central government does pay for the upkeep of madrassas in most states, and Islamic teachers are paid out of public funds. In addition, there is a sizable subsidy (though the amount is not publicly known) for the propagation of the Urdu language. Most states have also made provisions for financing madrassas, particularly in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala.
Again, these figures are kept well shrouded, and exact amounts are almost impossible to come by. Data given in provisional budget speeches is in round figures, and most is said to remain unspent. As such, it is all but impossible to estimate exactly how much is spent each year by the central and state governments on madrassas and related scholarship, teachers’ salaries, books and Urdu-language promotion. Even if this figure runs into the billions of rupees, as charged by the Sangh Parivar, it could easily be explained as legitimate expenses for ‘human-resource development’.
The subsidy for Haj is a more complicated matter entirely. There is no equivalent of Haj in any other religion: the Hindu teeraths do not come close, and Christianity has nothing remotely similar. Even in Islam, Haj is obligatory only for those who are in sound health and can afford it. They cannot perform the pilgrimage on borrowed money, nor on the charity of others. There is likewise no mention of help from the state, other than facilitation.
Last year, one B N Shukla went to court against the Haj subsidy, demanding it be withdrawn. His plaint pointed out that the Constitution provides equal status to all Indians, while also restricting the government from giving benefits to one faith at the cost of others. Shukla did not site any official record, but alleged that every year the government spends more than INR 3 billion on more than 100,000 Hajjis. Special flights are run on the national carrier, Air India; air-conditioned Haj houses have been built across the country; and pilgrims are provided free food and lodging during the course of their trip. Even Islamic countries do not give subsidies for Haj, Shukla’s application noted. A notice was subsequently sent to the government, the official response to which was reiterated in its response to a question in Parliament.
The Haj subsidy was formally raised in the Parliamentary Standing Committee on External Affairs during P V Narasimha Rao’s government, following the demolition of the Babri Masjid in December 1992. All parties were represented in the Committee, and the recommendation to reduce and eventually abolish the subsidy was unanimous. Fourteen years later, in 2006, the government reported that 83,000 pilgrims performed the Haj during the previous year, out of which the government subsidised around INR 1.8 billion. For good measure, Parliament was told that 529 Hindu pilgrims performed the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra that same year, at a public cost of INR 17.2 million. Minister of State for External Affairs Anand Sharma, who reported these figures, also said that 8179 people visited Sikh gurudwaras and Hindu temples in Pakistan the previous year. Both groups were given free medical assistance, security and various escorts.
For the RSS, the Haj-related data came at an opportune time. It reported a 500 percent increase in just seven years, which the RSS described as an “alarming, non-secular appeasement of one religious community when one considers that the Indian government is so desperate to reduce food grains and fertiliser subsidy to the large and poor farming community.”
Muslims and secular scholars alike point out that the Haj subsidy began during the early 1970s, after the oil crisis had caused Haj-related transportation prices to skyrocket. It was introduced as something of a stopgap measure – and the charge of official ‘appeasement’ of minorities has lingered ever since. The Haj charter fare was first fixed at INR 6000, before being eventually doubled. Of the 120,000 Indian Muslims who undertook the Mecca pilgrimage this year, some 70,000 went by air, and were able to avail themselves of a subsidy of more than INR 20,000 per person. (There is no subsidy for the 50,000 others who went by ship.) But former Member of Parliament Syed Shahabuddin points out that many Indian Muslim pilgrims come from rural areas, and are not even aware of the government subsidy. As such, much of this money is simply going to an elite group of Muslims, who would, one would assume, least need the taxpayer’s subsidy.
Islam in India further benefits from the public exchequer in the larger mosques, which receive government doles for salaries, annual upkeep and additional expenses. As elsewhere, however, very little information on these headings is public.
Mela monies
The situation with regards to Hinduism is even murkier. Despite the significant attention paid to the interface between the government and Islam, rarely are questions raised regarding government subsidies to Hindu and Sikh pilgrimages, in temple upkeep, in paying for the salaries of Hindu priests, and in maintaining public spaces during such events as the Maha and Ardha kumbhs. (Christians, meanwhile, claim that there is next to no money spent on them, other than by the Archaeological Survey of India on heritage buildings in Goa, or by the British government on graves for soldiers.)
As noted, Hindus do receive government subsidies for pilgrimages to Mount Kailash, and from a variety of sources. First, the Ministry of External Affairs routes INR 3250 to each Kailash yatri. The Uttar Pradesh state government then adds INR 5000 per pilgrim. The Delhi state government adds another INR 5000 for any pilgrim from Delhi. Likewise, the Gujarat government gives a kit worth INR 2500 to every yatri from that state. This kind of subsidy may well be given by other states as well, although such information is not publicly available.
Gujarat presents a particularly interesting case of state money being funnelled towards Hindu causes. The BJP government in 2001 announced that it would begin paying monthly salaries to Hindu priests in the state. During the first phase, each priest of the 354 government-controlled devasthans, or temples, would be entitled to a monthly salary of about INR 1200. The late Haren Pandya, at that time Minister of State for Home Affairs with the additional charge of “pilgrimage development and cow protection”, told the media that priests of other religions were paid from either the Waqf Board or trusts managing the place of worship. The new payments were “to give justice to the feelings of the Hindu society that salaries are being paid to them”, Pandya explained.
There is some information available on the tab for massive Hindu fairs, although much of this spending is merely labelled as ‘infrastructure development’. The grounds of the gargantuan 12-yearly Allahabad Maha Kumbh, for instance, are spread over 1500 hectares. During the last Kumbh Mela, in 2001, the site boasted 12,000 taps, capable of supplying 50.4 million litres of water; 450 kilometres of electric lines and 15,000 streetlights in place; 70,000 toilets; and 7100 sweepers to clean up the mess generated by an estimated five million devotees. There were also 11 post offices and 3000 temporary phone connections, while 4000 buses and five trains were also requisitioned for the mela period. At its peak, the mela administration had more than 80 officials working full time. The budget for all of this was INR 1.2 billion – INR 800 million from the state government, and INR 400 million from the Centre. This did not include the costs of deploying around 11,000 policemen, as well as 40 companies of the Provincial Armed Constabulary and other paramilitary forces.
The case of the Ujjain Ardha Kumbh, in Madhya Pradesh in April 2004, was no different. At that time, Chief Minister Uma Bharati promised that she would do all she could for the festival, which at the time was expecting millions of pilgrims. Bharati ultimately received additional funds from the Centre to the tune of INR 10 billion.
Melas and pilgrimages aside, the government does not reveal how much it costs to broadcast the gurubani from the Golden Temple in Amritsar, nor explain why some temples and church groups receive tax exemptions on commercial activities such as medical colleges, charging hundreds of thousands of rupees in capitation or admission charges.
Faithful monies
Hopefully, right-to-information exercises will soon help the public assess the full extent of direct, indirect and tertiary financing of the faith in India. Or will it?
The courts are themselves not insulated from dabbling or intervening in matters of faith. This is not merely to do with the photographs of Hindu deities in the reception rooms of the Supreme Court in New Delhi. Nor is it only to do with judges like Justice Srivastava and their obviously religious biases. Rather, this is a problem of systemic lack of separation between religion and the judiciary, as well as the other arms of the state, which only public vigilance can expose.
Yet keeping track of government and private funding of religion in India requires apparatus that even the Right to Information Bill seems incapable of offering – at least in its current avatar, in which government reasoning and official notes remain out of the public domain.
It was during the Emergency, in 1976, that Indira Gandhi brought forward the Foreign Contributions Regulation Act (FCRA). This was to keep an eye on – and, if possible, to prevent – the flow of alleged West European funds to the Gandhi Peace Foundation, as well as other organisations that supported the popular agitation led by Jayprakash Narayan. The FCRA has been used largely to scrutinise Christians priests and nuns, a few Muslim groups and secular NGOs who receive funding through official channels. Meanwhile, hawala dealers are able to evade FCRA checks with the same felicity that they avoid Home Ministry surveillance. Recent unofficial research has found that the foreign money coming to large Hindutva and Islamic groups by way of personal donations and hawala transactions runs into the tens of billions of dollars.
The indication of monies received comes only through the visible evidence of where the money has gone. There is a rash of temple-school complexes in about around 100,000 villages in central India and Gujarat that have not been financed through documented means. Meanwhile, the growth of mosques in the Tarai belt along the Nepali border is a visible red rag to Hindu activists. Exactly who pays for the massive rallies sponsored in pursuit of politico-religious agendas remains a question no one wants to answer. The lack of transparency contributes to the increase in fundamentalist activities of all hues, funded by money that enters the country through dubious means.
The question of whether a secular state should be allowed to finance religious activities at all is a part of the extensive debate as to how exactly to define ‘secularism’ in the Indian context. But that politicians in power are potentially able to utilise state funds to further the religious agendas espoused by their parties should surely be a matter of concern for democratic-rights activists and secular citizens alike.
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Thursday, September 20, 2007
Recording violence against Christians in India
John Dayal Response to questions by Journalist Vishal Arora on the United States
Question: I m writing a story talking about how the statistics of anti-Christian attacks in India is alarming and worrisome. I have heard many people who are involved in international advocacy for the persecuted church as saying that governments in many countries feel that the incidence of persecution is not a cause for concern because the population of India is more than one billion (So what if 150 or 200 attacks take place?). I am using the US international religious freedom report as the peg for the story.
RESPONSE:
I was saddened to read your note.
I understand the western attitude, and am not surprised at all.
First of all we are dealing with NGOs in a post Christian post modern West. Does it really matter to the people at large if the Christian is wiped out in the East and South.
Perhaps secularism has turned full circle and now seen with Veda chanting in US Senate, Yoga in England and a free visa to any Hindu tantric who wants it, even if India bans all Christians preachers from its soil coming from the west or the east.
I do not mean to scoff at genuine, well meaning and honest advocacy groups to whom I remain indebted for their continuing support to the Freedom of Faith and Civil Liberties activists such as I. It is their support that sustains me -- their moral support, for I do not have an FCRA account and do not receive moneys from any source other than few personal friends and supporters.. I am, as you know, not backed by the Indian church which has to protect its institutions and its presence and cannot take an open and aggressive position of human rights issues, much as individual priests may want to, or even as the Bible may command us to do.
Now about figures.
Sudan, Burma and some other countries have persecution of a magnitude where even thousands killed in a week seem to be about average. Or Saudia where you can be jailed for bringing in a bible. I weep for every Christian killed, but figures seem to inure us to the crisis, and somehow in some evil conspiracy, make them invisible as human tragedy.
This is now how civil society and human rights issues work.
In India, it is not about gigantic data or pogroms, it is about civil rights, of which religious rights are important, above all, it is about the right to life. The most important of all.
India is a secular society by law, with a peculiar population. The bulk remains Hindu, at about 80 per cent even if we construe it to be made up of a series of macro minorities such as the Dalits, tribals and other backward castes. The ethos is Hindu and Hinduism is the `default religion’ as everyone well knows. Often, the State too seems ‘Hindu’.
Islam constitutes from 12 to 15 per cent -- smaller than the Hindus but a very large population group. They get killed by the hundreds, and sometimes by the thousands in pogroms, some of them sponsored by provincial governments. Muslims also live on conglomerations, often discernable sharply from the Hindu groups in the city-scape or the rural landscape. Muslims, even if two or three are killed in a month, remain confined to a defined are and police can record the violence and take action. This is called a riot. The violence against them follows a pattern, as has been proved in at least eight judicial enquiries in fifty years.
The government’s new law proposed against communal violence may curb anti Muslim violence but is impotent against anti Christian hate and violence we do not comer under the scrutiny of its defining and screening measures. The Christians constitute a mere 2.3 to 2.8 per cent population, going by the most generous estimates. They do not live in ghettos but are dispersed. They, unlike Muslims, also go out with a religious message inside Hindi majority areas. This is where they are targeted – the pattern of their interaction with Hindu fundamentalist segment of the society.
Christians are dispersed. The violence against them is also dispersed. It may be just one case a year in one village across the country. But there are four hundred thousand villages, and the total violence may be as much.
I record and prove between 200 to 400 cases of anti Christian violence a year in my unofficial white papers released annually since 1997. The total figure may be from one to two thousand such cases a year, perhaps even more.
How do we define this violence and persecution if governments continue to say these are isolated cases?
If one thousand isolated cases occur in one country, they fit a pattern.
As an example, in state like Lakshadweep where ninety-nine per cent of the population is Muslim, if the few Christians are killed or forced to flee, it means a hundred per cent or total elimination of Christianity in that state.
This is what the RSS groups are threatening in many villages, districts, even states.
I am happy at the routine focus the current US religious freedom report has given on India. This is one of the few authentic international commentaries on freedom of faith in India, and is therefore to be welcomed. We hope there will be more international investigations the freedom of faith situation in India and other countries. This may seem anti national, but India is a signatory to international human rights covenants and it is important that there is total transparency in assessing freedom of faith in India.
At the South Asian level, even Islamic groups, a majority elsewhere, are a minority in India. Hindus are a majority in India, Fiji, Nepal and some other countries in the Carob islands and some Pacific or Indian Ocean islands. Indians are also victims of human rights violations in Pakistan, Bangladesh and other places. Christians are a major victim in all the eight south Asian countries.
In India, no political party is really innocent in the matter. The BJP and its frontal organisations of the Sangh Parivar are guilty in the extreme as we have see in Orissa, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and other area. These are states where the police do not register cases when Christians are victim and Sangh Parivar is the aggressor. And yet the same police accompanied Sangh aggression storm troopers when they attack home churches, or conduct the so called Ghar wapsi. The Sangh privet's violence is now at its peak.
The Congress party however is no less guilty.
Dispute the confused secularism of the top leaders including cabinet ministers, Prime Minister Manmohan Singha and Mrs. Sonia Gandhi, and despite the effort of the National Commission of Minorities, it needs to be remembered that violence continues in Congress states such as Andhra Pradesh.
Other Congress states such as Himachal have also passed the same laws against Christian activity that have been put in place by BJP state government. The stable state of Andhra Pradesh ahs banned Christian and Muslim activity in seven hills around the Tirupathi temple by an executive order. Now it is bending backwards to please the Sangh Parivar in other issues, including the so called ram setu or Adam's bridge issue.
The Union government has to ensure that the state remains secular and it does not encourage the mixing of religion and politics.
The mixing of Religion and policies missing is the worst thing possible in a country such as India with so many different regions, communities and also on.
This American report also puts a pressure on the US government to ensure that it soil is not abused by NRIs to fund the Sangh Parivar in India.
John Dayal
Question: I m writing a story talking about how the statistics of anti-Christian attacks in India is alarming and worrisome. I have heard many people who are involved in international advocacy for the persecuted church as saying that governments in many countries feel that the incidence of persecution is not a cause for concern because the population of India is more than one billion (So what if 150 or 200 attacks take place?). I am using the US international religious freedom report as the peg for the story.
RESPONSE:
I was saddened to read your note.
I understand the western attitude, and am not surprised at all.
First of all we are dealing with NGOs in a post Christian post modern West. Does it really matter to the people at large if the Christian is wiped out in the East and South.
Perhaps secularism has turned full circle and now seen with Veda chanting in US Senate, Yoga in England and a free visa to any Hindu tantric who wants it, even if India bans all Christians preachers from its soil coming from the west or the east.
I do not mean to scoff at genuine, well meaning and honest advocacy groups to whom I remain indebted for their continuing support to the Freedom of Faith and Civil Liberties activists such as I. It is their support that sustains me -- their moral support, for I do not have an FCRA account and do not receive moneys from any source other than few personal friends and supporters.. I am, as you know, not backed by the Indian church which has to protect its institutions and its presence and cannot take an open and aggressive position of human rights issues, much as individual priests may want to, or even as the Bible may command us to do.
Now about figures.
Sudan, Burma and some other countries have persecution of a magnitude where even thousands killed in a week seem to be about average. Or Saudia where you can be jailed for bringing in a bible. I weep for every Christian killed, but figures seem to inure us to the crisis, and somehow in some evil conspiracy, make them invisible as human tragedy.
This is now how civil society and human rights issues work.
In India, it is not about gigantic data or pogroms, it is about civil rights, of which religious rights are important, above all, it is about the right to life. The most important of all.
India is a secular society by law, with a peculiar population. The bulk remains Hindu, at about 80 per cent even if we construe it to be made up of a series of macro minorities such as the Dalits, tribals and other backward castes. The ethos is Hindu and Hinduism is the `default religion’ as everyone well knows. Often, the State too seems ‘Hindu’.
Islam constitutes from 12 to 15 per cent -- smaller than the Hindus but a very large population group. They get killed by the hundreds, and sometimes by the thousands in pogroms, some of them sponsored by provincial governments. Muslims also live on conglomerations, often discernable sharply from the Hindu groups in the city-scape or the rural landscape. Muslims, even if two or three are killed in a month, remain confined to a defined are and police can record the violence and take action. This is called a riot. The violence against them follows a pattern, as has been proved in at least eight judicial enquiries in fifty years.
The government’s new law proposed against communal violence may curb anti Muslim violence but is impotent against anti Christian hate and violence we do not comer under the scrutiny of its defining and screening measures. The Christians constitute a mere 2.3 to 2.8 per cent population, going by the most generous estimates. They do not live in ghettos but are dispersed. They, unlike Muslims, also go out with a religious message inside Hindi majority areas. This is where they are targeted – the pattern of their interaction with Hindu fundamentalist segment of the society.
Christians are dispersed. The violence against them is also dispersed. It may be just one case a year in one village across the country. But there are four hundred thousand villages, and the total violence may be as much.
I record and prove between 200 to 400 cases of anti Christian violence a year in my unofficial white papers released annually since 1997. The total figure may be from one to two thousand such cases a year, perhaps even more.
How do we define this violence and persecution if governments continue to say these are isolated cases?
If one thousand isolated cases occur in one country, they fit a pattern.
As an example, in state like Lakshadweep where ninety-nine per cent of the population is Muslim, if the few Christians are killed or forced to flee, it means a hundred per cent or total elimination of Christianity in that state.
This is what the RSS groups are threatening in many villages, districts, even states.
I am happy at the routine focus the current US religious freedom report has given on India. This is one of the few authentic international commentaries on freedom of faith in India, and is therefore to be welcomed. We hope there will be more international investigations the freedom of faith situation in India and other countries. This may seem anti national, but India is a signatory to international human rights covenants and it is important that there is total transparency in assessing freedom of faith in India.
At the South Asian level, even Islamic groups, a majority elsewhere, are a minority in India. Hindus are a majority in India, Fiji, Nepal and some other countries in the Carob islands and some Pacific or Indian Ocean islands. Indians are also victims of human rights violations in Pakistan, Bangladesh and other places. Christians are a major victim in all the eight south Asian countries.
In India, no political party is really innocent in the matter. The BJP and its frontal organisations of the Sangh Parivar are guilty in the extreme as we have see in Orissa, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and other area. These are states where the police do not register cases when Christians are victim and Sangh Parivar is the aggressor. And yet the same police accompanied Sangh aggression storm troopers when they attack home churches, or conduct the so called Ghar wapsi. The Sangh privet's violence is now at its peak.
The Congress party however is no less guilty.
Dispute the confused secularism of the top leaders including cabinet ministers, Prime Minister Manmohan Singha and Mrs. Sonia Gandhi, and despite the effort of the National Commission of Minorities, it needs to be remembered that violence continues in Congress states such as Andhra Pradesh.
Other Congress states such as Himachal have also passed the same laws against Christian activity that have been put in place by BJP state government. The stable state of Andhra Pradesh ahs banned Christian and Muslim activity in seven hills around the Tirupathi temple by an executive order. Now it is bending backwards to please the Sangh Parivar in other issues, including the so called ram setu or Adam's bridge issue.
The Union government has to ensure that the state remains secular and it does not encourage the mixing of religion and politics.
The mixing of Religion and policies missing is the worst thing possible in a country such as India with so many different regions, communities and also on.
This American report also puts a pressure on the US government to ensure that it soil is not abused by NRIs to fund the Sangh Parivar in India.
John Dayal
Wall Street Journal on Dalit Christians
THE 'UNTOUCHABLES'In India, 'Untouchables' ConvertTo Christianity -- and Face Extra Bias
By YAROSLAV TROFIMOVSeptember 19, 2007; Page A1
MEDIPALLY, India -- Every Sunday, women and children gather to pray in a tiny, whitewashed church on the edge of this southern Indian village, sitting cross-legged on blue plastic sheets as they sing Christian hymns.
The men don't dare to come. "If they are seen in the church, the officials will be informed," says Vatipally Aharon, Medipally's Baptist pastor.
Almost all the Christians here -- and the overwhelming majority across India -- hail from the so-called Dalit community, the former "untouchables" relegated to the bottom of the Hindu caste hierarchy. Under India's constitution, Dalits are entitled to affirmative-action benefits, including 15% of all federal government jobs and admissions in government-funded universities. That provides the country's most downtrodden with a way to escape their traditional occupations such as emptying village latrines, burying cow carcasses, and tanning animal hides.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Only women and children risk expressing their religious beliefs in the Dalit community in Medipally, India.
But there is a catch: Any Dalit caught abandoning Hinduism for Christianity or Islam loses these privileges, and can be fired from jobs gained under the quota. The rules are enforced by vigilant local officials who keep a close eye on villagers' comings and goings.
The plight of India's secret converts, ignored for decades, is now at the forefront of national politics. Partly driving the change is Indian Christians' new partnership with Islam, a religion frequently at odds with Christianity elsewhere in the world.
Representatives of the two religions have turned to the courts to restore benefits to converted Dalits. India's Supreme Court is currently reviewing several challenges filed by Christian and Muslim Dalits that could result in an overturning of the affirmative-action exclusion. A separate bill to remove the restriction is pending in Parliament. Government members, influenced by India's 150-million-strong Muslim community, have indicated their cautious support.
For decades, backers of the existing legislation have argued that since Christianity and Islam have no caste, Dalits who abandon Hinduism find equality amid their new co-religionists and therefore no longer need special protection.
Scrapping the Ban
But the movement to end official discrimination against these converts is gaining momentum in the world's largest democracy. This year, a special government-appointed commission, headed by former Supreme Court Chief Justice Ranganath Mishra, concluded that Dalits retain their stigma in India's society even after converting and recommended scrapping the ban.
The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination earlier this year also formally rebuked India for denying affirmative-action benefits to Dalit converts to Christianity and Islam, and recommended that the prohibition be removed.
"The government of India seems quite sympathetic" to such demands, says Sardar Buta Singh, a minister-level official who heads India's agency overseeing Dalit affairs, the National Commission for Scheduled Castes. "All the parties have started thinking about this problem, and it can be solved."
India's Dalits have tried over the centuries to escape their low status, which Hindu scriptures teach is a punishment for sins in a previous life, by embracing caste-less religions. In centuries past most converts turned to Islam, a religion professed by many Indian rulers before the British seized the subcontinent in the 19th century.
But with India's expanding economy offering unprecedented opportunities for social and economic advancement, a great many Dalits are now turning to Christianity, attracted by benefits like education and health care that are sometimes offered by Western-funded congregations. This allows them to seek opportunities beyond the government sector, in the booming information-technology and services industries that put a premium on the Westernized outlook and English-language skills.
Much to the dismay of Hindu nationalist groups, the number of India's secret Christians has climbed in recent years to an estimated 25 million people, about the size of the officially registered Christian population.
The gains among secret Christians come despite the obvious risks: Affirmative-action benefits often mean the difference between grinding poverty and a glimmer of hope for better life.
A lanky 30-year-old with a trimmed mustache, Venkatesh Gunti was born into a Dalit household here in Medipally, a cluster of pastel-colored homes set in the rolling green hills of Andhra Pradesh state. Since his teenage years, Mr. Gunti frequently prayed in the village's Zion church, established by South African missionaries. Three years ago, he found a prized job that would have allowed him to escape the misery of rural life -- as a handyman in a government college in the town of Bhongir.
Zoologist Mukesh Kumar says he was denied a job because he converted to Islam.
The job was reserved for a Dalit, and Mr. Gunti had to produce a "scheduled caste" certificate -- something he believed would be a mere formality.
But when Mr. Gunti applied for it at the local government revenue collection office, the clerk, Mr. Gunti recalls, refused to issue the document. According to reports filed by the village secretary, Mr. Gunti was a regular churchgoer and therefore no longer qualified for "scheduled caste" status. He didn't get the job and had to stay in the village, eking out a living as a manual laborer.
To gain back the affirmative-action benefits, Mr. Gunti says he had to pretend that he had reverted to Hinduism, participating in a Hindu religious festival when he knew that the village secretary was watching. Last year, the subterfuge finally worked, and Mr. Gunti was reclassified as a member of the "scheduled caste." He says he won't partake in any more Hindu rituals, but will also steer clear of the church. Mr. Gunti has yet to find a new job.
Questioned about the case, Raghu Rama Rao, Medipally's village secretary, explains that he has no choice. "This is the law -- if we'll come to know they go to church, we'll have to make an inquiry and submit a report," Mr. Rao says in his home, its outer wall sporting a poster for a Hindu nationalist organization. Mr. Rao adds that he's already showing kindness by reporting only the active churchgoers, and leaving alone those believed Christian Dalits who do not openly flaunt their faith.
Such thorough enforcement means that secret lives have to be lived throughout India's society. "If they ever find out I'm a Christian, I will lose my position, no question about it," says a Dalit schoolteacher who behaves as a Hindu when he teaches in a state school near Medipally but decorates his Hyderabad apartment with pictures of Jesus and the Virgin Mary.
"The government is forcing us to lie," echoes Prasadarao Yadavalli, a 48-year-old official in Andhra Pradesh's state bureaucracy who rose to his post thanks to Dalit quotas while hiding his Christian faith. Mr. Yadavalli says he has decided to finally come out this year, as he could no longer maintain this double life: "Whatever the consequences, God will take care of us."
Even one of the Dalit converts who petitioned India's Supreme Court is keeping his true beliefs secret from neighbors.
Mukesh Kumar, a zoologist, complained in an affidavit submitted to the Supreme Court in 2005 that he was denied a university job reserved for Dalits because he converted to Islam. His wife, Reena, added in the same affidavit that she also wants to embrace Islam but is afraid to do so because she would lose her current job of village administrator, an elected position gained under the Dalit quota.
Posters of Holy Men
Interviewed in his village of Neyazoopura, in the northern Uttar Pradesh state, an agitated Dr. Kumar -- who helps his wife run the village administration -- initially denied any link with the Muslim religion. His office is decorated with posters of Hindu holy men. Only after hastily chasing away curious villagers and shutting the doors would Dr. Kumar, 37, confirm his signature on the affidavit. "It's a constitutional right to change a religion at any time if you want it," he says.
India's 1950 constitution indeed guarantees the freedom of faith, in addition to outlawing discrimination against the Dalits. But, in defining who is entitled to affirmative-action protection afforded to the Dalits, a 1950 presidential order excluded any "person who professes a religion different from Hinduism."
The rule was amended in 1956 to include Dalit Sikhs and in 1990 to embrace Dalit Buddhists, on the grounds that these two religions can be considered offshoots of Hinduism.
Indian Christian groups have tried for decades to win a similar exception for Christianity, which is believed to have arrived in India when St. Thomas disembarked in Kerala in the first century. A bill to do so was approved by the national government in 1996, but never made it to a Parliament vote because of a coalition crisis that prompted new elections; these were won by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.
The party is a staunch opponent of conversions from Hinduism, now practiced by 80.5% of the general population. "People convert to Christianity here mostly because of aggressive proselytizing by missionaries, who induce very gullible people. This must be stopped," says Ram Madhav, a spokesman and national executive member of Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, or RSS, a powerful organization that promotes Hindu nationalist ideology and is affiliated with the BJP.
The years of BJP rule were marked by violence against Muslim and Christian minorities. Facing a common enemy, India's Christian and Muslim organizations joined forces in protecting the country's secular tradition. Christian groups organized relief for Muslim refugees from religious pogroms in the state of Gujarat in 2002, and Christian churches were sheltered in some Muslim areas. Though the BJP has denied that some of its leaders helped orchestrate religious violence, the U.S. has since canceled the visa of Gujarat's chief minister, a BJP member, because of his role in the 2002 bloodshed.
"The Christians and the Muslims are a minority in India, they are both oppressed, and so there is a natural alliance between us," says Mahmood Madani, a Parliament member and secretary-general of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind, the country's leading Islamic body.
Viewing the Dalits as the main source of potential converts, some Christian and Muslim organizations started working together in recent years among these communities. While discrimination against Dalits is illegal, it is in practice widespread, particularly in rural parts of India, where people from higher castes often won't touch a Dalit or share with them food or water.
Here in Andhra Pradesh, Muslim and Christian leaders now regularly break this barrier of untouchability as they organize festive meals in Dalit villages, eating from the same giant plate of rice and vegetable curry.
"This is a real physical demonstration against caste discrimination," says Joseph D'souza, the president of the All-India Christian Council, who has organized many of these gatherings.
Though no open proselytizing is conducted at these events, shared meals frequently end up producing new converts. "The condition of Dalits is like that of dogs in India," says P.K. Ahmad Sabir, Andhra Pradesh state leader of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind and Mr. D'souza's partner in the Dalit outreach effort. "Our religions -- Christianity and Islam -- teach that everyone is an equal. Hindus don't believe in this, which gives a good chance to Christianity and Islam."
Joining Forces
In 2004, the votes of India's religious minorities helped oust the BJP government, bringing into office a center-left coalition led by the traditionally secularist Indian National Congress. This time around, the Muslims joined the earlier Christian campaign to end the discrimination against Dalit converts, and the issue returned to the government agenda.
"The Christian community has realized it is small compared to the Muslims, and that if they stand alone, they have a much smaller chance for success," says Tahir Mahmood, one of India's most prominent constitutional experts. "Together, they're a force to be reckoned with, and so they've become friends in adversity."
Instead of merely adding a waiver for Christianity to the 1950 presidential order, advocates today demand that any reference to religion be deleted from it altogether.
Campaigners are pressing the government to act without delay. "This is not just a Christian problem," says Jose Daniel, president of the National Coordination Committee for Scheduled Caste Christians and one of the petitioners in the Supreme Court challenge against the anticonvert rules. "It's a denial of rights to all the Dalits in India."
By YAROSLAV TROFIMOVSeptember 19, 2007; Page A1
MEDIPALLY, India -- Every Sunday, women and children gather to pray in a tiny, whitewashed church on the edge of this southern Indian village, sitting cross-legged on blue plastic sheets as they sing Christian hymns.
The men don't dare to come. "If they are seen in the church, the officials will be informed," says Vatipally Aharon, Medipally's Baptist pastor.
Almost all the Christians here -- and the overwhelming majority across India -- hail from the so-called Dalit community, the former "untouchables" relegated to the bottom of the Hindu caste hierarchy. Under India's constitution, Dalits are entitled to affirmative-action benefits, including 15% of all federal government jobs and admissions in government-funded universities. That provides the country's most downtrodden with a way to escape their traditional occupations such as emptying village latrines, burying cow carcasses, and tanning animal hides.
Yaroslav Trofimov
Only women and children risk expressing their religious beliefs in the Dalit community in Medipally, India.
But there is a catch: Any Dalit caught abandoning Hinduism for Christianity or Islam loses these privileges, and can be fired from jobs gained under the quota. The rules are enforced by vigilant local officials who keep a close eye on villagers' comings and goings.
The plight of India's secret converts, ignored for decades, is now at the forefront of national politics. Partly driving the change is Indian Christians' new partnership with Islam, a religion frequently at odds with Christianity elsewhere in the world.
Representatives of the two religions have turned to the courts to restore benefits to converted Dalits. India's Supreme Court is currently reviewing several challenges filed by Christian and Muslim Dalits that could result in an overturning of the affirmative-action exclusion. A separate bill to remove the restriction is pending in Parliament. Government members, influenced by India's 150-million-strong Muslim community, have indicated their cautious support.
For decades, backers of the existing legislation have argued that since Christianity and Islam have no caste, Dalits who abandon Hinduism find equality amid their new co-religionists and therefore no longer need special protection.
Scrapping the Ban
But the movement to end official discrimination against these converts is gaining momentum in the world's largest democracy. This year, a special government-appointed commission, headed by former Supreme Court Chief Justice Ranganath Mishra, concluded that Dalits retain their stigma in India's society even after converting and recommended scrapping the ban.
The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination earlier this year also formally rebuked India for denying affirmative-action benefits to Dalit converts to Christianity and Islam, and recommended that the prohibition be removed.
"The government of India seems quite sympathetic" to such demands, says Sardar Buta Singh, a minister-level official who heads India's agency overseeing Dalit affairs, the National Commission for Scheduled Castes. "All the parties have started thinking about this problem, and it can be solved."
India's Dalits have tried over the centuries to escape their low status, which Hindu scriptures teach is a punishment for sins in a previous life, by embracing caste-less religions. In centuries past most converts turned to Islam, a religion professed by many Indian rulers before the British seized the subcontinent in the 19th century.
But with India's expanding economy offering unprecedented opportunities for social and economic advancement, a great many Dalits are now turning to Christianity, attracted by benefits like education and health care that are sometimes offered by Western-funded congregations. This allows them to seek opportunities beyond the government sector, in the booming information-technology and services industries that put a premium on the Westernized outlook and English-language skills.
Much to the dismay of Hindu nationalist groups, the number of India's secret Christians has climbed in recent years to an estimated 25 million people, about the size of the officially registered Christian population.
The gains among secret Christians come despite the obvious risks: Affirmative-action benefits often mean the difference between grinding poverty and a glimmer of hope for better life.
A lanky 30-year-old with a trimmed mustache, Venkatesh Gunti was born into a Dalit household here in Medipally, a cluster of pastel-colored homes set in the rolling green hills of Andhra Pradesh state. Since his teenage years, Mr. Gunti frequently prayed in the village's Zion church, established by South African missionaries. Three years ago, he found a prized job that would have allowed him to escape the misery of rural life -- as a handyman in a government college in the town of Bhongir.
Zoologist Mukesh Kumar says he was denied a job because he converted to Islam.
The job was reserved for a Dalit, and Mr. Gunti had to produce a "scheduled caste" certificate -- something he believed would be a mere formality.
But when Mr. Gunti applied for it at the local government revenue collection office, the clerk, Mr. Gunti recalls, refused to issue the document. According to reports filed by the village secretary, Mr. Gunti was a regular churchgoer and therefore no longer qualified for "scheduled caste" status. He didn't get the job and had to stay in the village, eking out a living as a manual laborer.
To gain back the affirmative-action benefits, Mr. Gunti says he had to pretend that he had reverted to Hinduism, participating in a Hindu religious festival when he knew that the village secretary was watching. Last year, the subterfuge finally worked, and Mr. Gunti was reclassified as a member of the "scheduled caste." He says he won't partake in any more Hindu rituals, but will also steer clear of the church. Mr. Gunti has yet to find a new job.
Questioned about the case, Raghu Rama Rao, Medipally's village secretary, explains that he has no choice. "This is the law -- if we'll come to know they go to church, we'll have to make an inquiry and submit a report," Mr. Rao says in his home, its outer wall sporting a poster for a Hindu nationalist organization. Mr. Rao adds that he's already showing kindness by reporting only the active churchgoers, and leaving alone those believed Christian Dalits who do not openly flaunt their faith.
Such thorough enforcement means that secret lives have to be lived throughout India's society. "If they ever find out I'm a Christian, I will lose my position, no question about it," says a Dalit schoolteacher who behaves as a Hindu when he teaches in a state school near Medipally but decorates his Hyderabad apartment with pictures of Jesus and the Virgin Mary.
"The government is forcing us to lie," echoes Prasadarao Yadavalli, a 48-year-old official in Andhra Pradesh's state bureaucracy who rose to his post thanks to Dalit quotas while hiding his Christian faith. Mr. Yadavalli says he has decided to finally come out this year, as he could no longer maintain this double life: "Whatever the consequences, God will take care of us."
Even one of the Dalit converts who petitioned India's Supreme Court is keeping his true beliefs secret from neighbors.
Mukesh Kumar, a zoologist, complained in an affidavit submitted to the Supreme Court in 2005 that he was denied a university job reserved for Dalits because he converted to Islam. His wife, Reena, added in the same affidavit that she also wants to embrace Islam but is afraid to do so because she would lose her current job of village administrator, an elected position gained under the Dalit quota.
Posters of Holy Men
Interviewed in his village of Neyazoopura, in the northern Uttar Pradesh state, an agitated Dr. Kumar -- who helps his wife run the village administration -- initially denied any link with the Muslim religion. His office is decorated with posters of Hindu holy men. Only after hastily chasing away curious villagers and shutting the doors would Dr. Kumar, 37, confirm his signature on the affidavit. "It's a constitutional right to change a religion at any time if you want it," he says.
India's 1950 constitution indeed guarantees the freedom of faith, in addition to outlawing discrimination against the Dalits. But, in defining who is entitled to affirmative-action protection afforded to the Dalits, a 1950 presidential order excluded any "person who professes a religion different from Hinduism."
The rule was amended in 1956 to include Dalit Sikhs and in 1990 to embrace Dalit Buddhists, on the grounds that these two religions can be considered offshoots of Hinduism.
Indian Christian groups have tried for decades to win a similar exception for Christianity, which is believed to have arrived in India when St. Thomas disembarked in Kerala in the first century. A bill to do so was approved by the national government in 1996, but never made it to a Parliament vote because of a coalition crisis that prompted new elections; these were won by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.
The party is a staunch opponent of conversions from Hinduism, now practiced by 80.5% of the general population. "People convert to Christianity here mostly because of aggressive proselytizing by missionaries, who induce very gullible people. This must be stopped," says Ram Madhav, a spokesman and national executive member of Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, or RSS, a powerful organization that promotes Hindu nationalist ideology and is affiliated with the BJP.
The years of BJP rule were marked by violence against Muslim and Christian minorities. Facing a common enemy, India's Christian and Muslim organizations joined forces in protecting the country's secular tradition. Christian groups organized relief for Muslim refugees from religious pogroms in the state of Gujarat in 2002, and Christian churches were sheltered in some Muslim areas. Though the BJP has denied that some of its leaders helped orchestrate religious violence, the U.S. has since canceled the visa of Gujarat's chief minister, a BJP member, because of his role in the 2002 bloodshed.
"The Christians and the Muslims are a minority in India, they are both oppressed, and so there is a natural alliance between us," says Mahmood Madani, a Parliament member and secretary-general of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind, the country's leading Islamic body.
Viewing the Dalits as the main source of potential converts, some Christian and Muslim organizations started working together in recent years among these communities. While discrimination against Dalits is illegal, it is in practice widespread, particularly in rural parts of India, where people from higher castes often won't touch a Dalit or share with them food or water.
Here in Andhra Pradesh, Muslim and Christian leaders now regularly break this barrier of untouchability as they organize festive meals in Dalit villages, eating from the same giant plate of rice and vegetable curry.
"This is a real physical demonstration against caste discrimination," says Joseph D'souza, the president of the All-India Christian Council, who has organized many of these gatherings.
Though no open proselytizing is conducted at these events, shared meals frequently end up producing new converts. "The condition of Dalits is like that of dogs in India," says P.K. Ahmad Sabir, Andhra Pradesh state leader of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind and Mr. D'souza's partner in the Dalit outreach effort. "Our religions -- Christianity and Islam -- teach that everyone is an equal. Hindus don't believe in this, which gives a good chance to Christianity and Islam."
Joining Forces
In 2004, the votes of India's religious minorities helped oust the BJP government, bringing into office a center-left coalition led by the traditionally secularist Indian National Congress. This time around, the Muslims joined the earlier Christian campaign to end the discrimination against Dalit converts, and the issue returned to the government agenda.
"The Christian community has realized it is small compared to the Muslims, and that if they stand alone, they have a much smaller chance for success," says Tahir Mahmood, one of India's most prominent constitutional experts. "Together, they're a force to be reckoned with, and so they've become friends in adversity."
Instead of merely adding a waiver for Christianity to the 1950 presidential order, advocates today demand that any reference to religion be deleted from it altogether.
Campaigners are pressing the government to act without delay. "This is not just a Christian problem," says Jose Daniel, president of the National Coordination Committee for Scheduled Caste Christians and one of the petitioners in the Supreme Court challenge against the anticonvert rules. "It's a denial of rights to all the Dalits in India."
Monday, September 17, 2007
IN THE AGE OF RAM SETU, A LOOK AT WHAT THE RSS SAYS ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE'S GODS
FRONTLINE
India's National MagazineFrom the publishers of THE HINDU
Vol. 15 :: No. 26 :: Dec. 19, 1998 - Jan. 01, 1999
COLUMN
RSS and Christians
The Sangh Parivar's violent hatred against Christianity is deep-rooted and decades old, as is the case with its animosity against several other communities.
A. G. NOORANI
ON December 4, 1998, nearly 23 million Christians across the country observed a protest day demanding that the governments at the Centre and in the States check the growing violence against members of the community. A letter of protest, drawn up by the United Christians' Forum for Human Rights (UCFHR), said: "Since January 1998 there has been more violence against the Christian community than in all the 50 years of the country's Independence. Nuns have been raped, priests executed, Bibles burnt, churches demolished, educational institutions destroyed and religious people harassed." This is persecution in the strict dictionary meaning of the word "pursue with enmity and ill-treatment". Mabel Rebello of the Congress(I) told the Rajya Sabha that day that "50 per cent of these (incidents) have occurred in Gujarat where the BJP is in power".
On October 8, Gujarat's Director-General of Police, C.P. Singh, confirmed in an interview to Teesta Setalvad, co-editor of Communalism Combat (October 1998): "One thing was clear in the pattern of incidents. It was the activists of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal who were taking the law into their own hands, which posed a serious danger to peace in Gujarat. Many of the attacks on the minorities were after these organisations had whipped up local passions of conversions (by Christian missionaries) and allegedly forced inter-religious marriages... our investigations revealed that in most cases these were entirely baseless allegations."
Two disturbing features of the campaign stand out in bold relief. One is that the attacks mounted steeply after the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Government assumed office in March 1998. The Archbishop of Delhi, Alan de Lastic, said: "What I have noticed is that ever since this Government came to power at the Centre, the attacks on Christians and Christian missionaries have increased" (Sunday, November 22). The other is the Government's wilful refusal to condemn them. Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's remarks on December 5 were virtually forced out of him. Union Home Minister L.K. Advani has been false to his oath of office ("do right to all manner of people in accordance with the Constitution and the law without fear or favour, affection or ill-will"). He said in Baroda on August 2 (The Hindu, August 3): "There is no law and order problem in Gujarat." Three days later the DGP said, according to The Hindustan Times (August 6), that "the VHP and the Bajrang Dal were taking the law into their own hands." He also said that incidents of communal violence had increased manifold over the last few months; recently the crime rate in the State had increased by as much as 9.6 per cent. On an average, 39 crimes of serious nature like murder, rape and dacoity were reported in the State every day." A member of the investigation team sent by the Minorities Commission revealed: "After initial reluctance, the officials named VHP and Bajrang Dal allegedly involved in the mob attacks on Christians and Muslims" (The Indian Express, August 12). Advani's certificate of good conduct speaks for itself.
Christians did not rush to register their protest, as they did on December 4, but for long kept pleading for succour. On October 1, the national secretary of the All India Catholic Union (AICU), John Dayal, pointedly remarked: "The AICU is surprised that Union Government and members of the ruling coalition, including the BJP, have not come out categorically in denouncing the violence against Christians."
The Bajrang Dal has threatened Christian-run educational institutions in Karnataka with dire consequences if they did not "Hinduise" them. Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh leader Rajendra Singh declared at an RSS camp in Meerut on November 22: "Muslims and Christians will have to accept Hindu culture as their own if Hindus are to treat them as Indians" (an Agence France Presse: report in The Asian Age; November 23). The UCFHR bitterly complained in an open letter published on November 19: "The state has failed to do its duty in protecting the life, dignity and property of the victims. At many places, it seems as if the Centre and the State governments have tacitly supported the communal groups. How is it otherwise that the State governments have not taken any action against the virulent and anti-national statements of the VHP, RSS, Jagran Manch and Bajrang Dal?" (emphasis added, throughout).
While the Sangh Parivar's animosity towards Muslims is well-known, its attitude towards Christians has taken many people by surprise. But, Vishwa Hindu Parishad general secretary Giriraj Kishore said in Chandigarh on November 25: "Today the Christians constitute a greater threat than the collective threat from separatist Muslim elements." Describing G. S. Tohra, president of the Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee, as a "separatist", he said, "all minorities including Muslims and Christians must accept that their ancestors were Hindus." Ergo, they must all return to the Hindu fold.
Violence in speech inevitably inspires violent acts. As the Jaganmohan Reddy Commission that went into the Ahmedabad riots (1969) noted, once communal tension is created in a city, all that is needed is "only a match to set on fire and a fan to fan the city ablaze." Riots erupt over trifling incidents only because the atmosphere has been fouled up. Hence, the need for "a proper appreciation of the communal atmosphere in a State, in a town or in any particular area," the Commission stressed. Those who spread hate are the real perpetrators of violence. The ones who wield the weapon are their mindless agents.
We have tended to ignore a fact that brooks no neglect - the real cause of the communal riots is the rise of the Sangh Parivar. There was communal peace even in the early years after Partition. A Home Ministry review presented to the National Integration Council in 1968 noted: "From 1954 to 1960, there was a clear and consistent downward trend, 1960 being a remarkably good year with only 26 communal incidents in the whole country. This trend was sharply reversed in 1961. "That was when riots erupted in Jabalpur - thanks to the Jan Sangh, the BJP's ancestor. Communal violence has not "looked back" since.
Justice P. Venugopal, a former Judge of the Madras High Court, who inquired into Hindu-Christian clashes in Kanyakumari district in March 1982, noted: "The RSS adopts a militant and aggressive attitude and sets itself as the champion of what it considers to be the rights of Hindus against minorities. It has taken upon itself the task to teach the minority their place and if they are not willing to learn their place, teach them a lesson. The RSS has given respectability to communalism and communal riots and demoralise administration (sic). The RSS methodology for provoking communal violence is: (a) rousing communal feelings in the majority community by the propaganda that Christians are not loyal citizens of this country..." Report after report has indicted the RSS specifically or its affiliates (Ahmedabad 1969; Bhiwandi 1970; Tellicherry 1971; Jamshedpur 1981; and Mumbai 1993).
VIOLENCE is an integral part of the RSS credo. "It should be used as a surgeon's knife... to cure the society... Sometimes to protect non-violence itself violence becomes necessary," RSS leader M.S. Golwalkar said in 1952. (Spotlights: Guruji Answers, pages 110 and 188). In his fine work India as a Secular State, Donald Eugene Smith recalled the desecration of a church in Bihar in 1955 and the almost total destruction in 1957 of the Gass Memorial Centre at Raipur.
V.D. Savarkar wrote repeatedly in his book Hindutva (1923): "Hindutva is different from Hinduism." For once, he was right. Hinduism is a great religion, it is ancient. Hindutva is an ideology of hate. It is recent. He grouped Muslims and Christians together as ones who do not share "the tie of the common homage we pay to our great civilisation - our Hindu culture." He added: "Christian and Mohammedan communities who were but very recently Hindus... cannot be recognised as Hindus as since their adoption of the new cult they had ceased to own Hindu civilisation (Sanskriti) as a whole... For though Hindusthan to them is Fatherland, as to any other Hindu, yet it is not to them a Holyland too. Their holyland is far off in Arabia or Palestine."
They are not the only offenders: "Look at the Jews; neither centuries of prosperity nor sense of gratitude for the shelter they found can make them more attached or even equally attached to the several countries they inhabit."
Golwalkar revealed on May 15, 1963 that his first book We or Our Nationhood Defined was based on Savarkar's brother Babarao's book in Marathi on the same theme, Rashtra Mimamsa. Golwalkar's second book, Bunch of Thoughts, praised the book Hindutva and amplified its ideology. The BJP has used it as a political weapon with dangerous consequences. Chapter XII of Bunch of Thoughts is devoted to three "Internal Threats" - Muslims, Christians and the Communists. Of the first two he wrote: "Together with the change in their faith, gone are the spirit of love and devotion for the nation. Nor does it end there. They have also developed a feeling of identification with the enemies of this land. They look to some foreign lands as their holy places." They are asked to return to the Hindu fold.
Not that that will be of much help. "For a Hindu, he gets the first sanskar when he is still in his mother's womb... We are, therefore, born as Hindus. About the others, they are born to this world as simple unnamed human beings and later on, either circumcised or baptised, they become Muslims or Christians." The hatred is unconcealed. They have no right to proselytise. Hindus alone have it, for, "returning to one's ancestral faith is not conversion at all, it is merely home-coming."
Bunch of Thoughts first appeared in 1966 but the good work has been stepped up since. To the three "internal threats", a fourth is added - "Nehruism" - and among the perils we face is "Macaulayism". In Delhi functions an outfit, Voice of India, which proclaims: "We are not general booksellers and handle only books listed in this catalogue. Please do not ask for other books." It is an outfit with a mission. For the catalogue has an "appeal" which reads thus: "Hindu society and culture are faced with a crisis. There is a united front of entrenched alien forces - Islam, Christianity, Communism, Nehruism - to disrupt and discredit the perennial values of the Indian ethos. All who care for India need to know what is happening, and what is to be done if a major tragedy is to be averted. Voice of India aims at providing an ideological defence of Hindu society and culture, through a series of publications."
SOME people were surprised by Advani's assertion at a seminar on November 6 at Sarnath that "the Buddha did not announce any new religion. He was only restating with a new emphasis the ancient ideals of the Indo-Aryan civilisation." The Buddha, he added, derived his teaching from the Bhagvad Gita and was an avatar of Vishnu. Rebuttals from Buddhists were swift and sharp (see "Hindutva's fallacies and fantasies", Frontline, December 4, 1998).
However, no one familiar with the stuff churned out by this factory, for over four decades, would have been surprised. Its literature is intolerant of any cultural and religious diversity. It fosters a siege mentality among Hindus and speaks disparagingly of all others - not excluding Sikhs and Jews. That is not all. A Hindu who does not share its bigotry is attacked as being "anti-Hindu". Its literature represents the spirit, outlook and ethos of the Sangh Parivar. The writings cited below reveal a revolting virulence. Its moving spirit is one Sita Ram Goel.
The Parivar's organ Organiser only recently (October 18, 1998) published a paper he had written in 1983. He wrote: "The English-educated Hindu elite which controls the commanding heights in government, educational institutions and mass media has failed the test either because it has become indifferent to Hindu society, as a result of having imbibed the current cosmopolitan culture, or because it has been trained to look at Hindu society through eyes which are not of its own ancestral culture and, as a result, has become sceptical about, if not actually hostile to, the merits of Hindu society. This desperate situation has been made more difficult by a degenerate politics through which vote-hungry, sloganised, short-sighted and nominally Hindu politicians weaken Hindu society by dividing it on the basis of caste, sect, language and region, disarm Hindu society by sanctimonious and one-sided appeals in the name of traditional Hindu tolerance, strengthen alienated and aggressive communities by supporting their separatist demands in the name of secularism." His intolerance brings all within the sway of his indictment, bar the Parivar itself.
TO return to Advani's notions on Buddhism, a pamphlet entitled "Buddhism vis-a-vis Hinduism" published 40 years ago by Ram Swarup for the outfit asserts: "Buddha, his spiritual experiences and teachings, formed part of a Hindu tradition... A good Buddhist has perforce to be a good Hindu too." He went on to attack "foreign" religions. "The indigenous religions of the countries of the two Americas have been completely overwhelmed. In the African sub-continent (sic) the local religions are under a systematic attack from Islamic and Christian ideologies." The Parivar takes a dim view of the United States.
Golwalkar was asked in July 1967: "What is your opinion about present-day America?" There was lot to comment about - racial conflict, Vietnam policy, and so on. All he could say was: "Do you not yourself see that the American youth is fast dissipating himself in all kinds of sensual indulgence?" Simplistic, sweeping, defamatory judgment comes easily to the tribe.
Ram Swarup's tract Hinduism vis-a-vis Christianity and Islam continued his refrain about "native" faiths. "What is happening in India is also happening elsewhere. In America even the vestiges of once (sic), a rich spiritual culture of the Indians, is no more." He developed the theme in its sequel Hindu View of Christianity and Islam (1992). "The two ideologies have been active and systematic persecutors of pagan nations, cultures and religions... We have spoken here with sympathy and respect not only of pagan Americas and Africa but also of the pagan past of Egypt, Greece, Rome, Iran, Syria and Arabia." V.S. Naipaul is in good company with the Sangh Parivar. Unlike him, it indicts Christianity as well as Islam on this score.
"Hinduism can help all peoples seeking religious self-renewal, for it preserves in some way their old Gods and religions, it preserves in its various layers religious traditions and intuitions they have lost. Many countries now under Christianity and Islam had once great religions; they also had great Gods who adequately fulfilled their spiritual and ethical needs... during the long period of neglect, they lost the knowledge which could revive those Gods, Hinduism can help them with this knowledge. In its simplest aspect, Europeans can best study their old pre-Christian religion by studying Hinduism."
Ram Swarup goes on to quote approvingly: "Gore Vidal says that from a 'barbaric Bronze Age text known as Old Testament, three anti-human religions have evolved - Judaism, Christianity and Islam'; he also calls them 'sky-god religions'."
Ram Swarup damns all three religions as "great persecutors". The Hindu response of old was wrong. He writes:
"First, they tried to 'reform' themselves and be like their rulers... One God, a revealed Book and prophets.... The Brahmo Samaj, the Arya Samaj, and the Akalis also claimed monotheism and iconoclasm ... in the case of the Akalis, the new look has also become the basis of a new separatist-militant politics....
"The second way the Hindus adopted was that of 'synthesis'. The synthesizers claimed that all religions preach the same thing. They found in the Bible and the Quran all the truths of the Upanishads and vice versa. They culled passages from various scriptures to prove their point... It is by such methods that they proved that the Bible and the Quran were no different from the Upanishads...."
The wrath wells up as he proceeds and delivers a message which explains why the country has had to undergo what it has all these years, especially since 1990: "India became politically free in 1947, but it is ruled by anti-Hindu Hindus. The old mental slavery continues and it has yet to win its cultural and intellectual independence. India is entering into the second phase of its freedom struggle; the struggle for regaining its Hindu identity. The new struggle is as difficult as the old one. Hindus are disorganised, self-alienated, morally and ideologically disarmed. They lack leadership; the Hindu elites have become illiterate about their spiritual heritage and history and indifferent and even hostile towards their religion... India's higher education, its academia and media are in the hands of a Hindu-hating elite."
Note what Ram Swarup has to say of the caste system:
"Once when Hinduism was strong, castes represented a natural and healthy diversity, but now in its present state of weakness these are used for its dismemberment. Old vested interests joined by new ones have come together to make use of the caste factor in a big way in order to keep Hindus down.
"Hindus have been kept down too long. Everyone including the victims think that it is the natural order of things. Therefore, now when the Hindu society is showing some signs of stir, there is a great consternation. Already a cry has gone out of Hindu fundamentalism, we must expect more of it in future." The readers have been warned. But India will not be the only country to be saved. "America is awaiting to be rediscovered in a characteristically Hindu way, not the Christian way".
THIS represents a worse-than-narrow world-view. It is redolent of the bigotry of medieval times. This book was published in 1992. His earlier pamphlet, "Cultural Self-Alienation and Some Problems Hinduism Faces", also characterised "castes and denominations" as expressing a "natural and healthy diversity". The ignorance is astounding. "To Marx, the British conquest of India was a blessing." Hinduism faces attacks "both from inside and outside. While the forces of self-alienation are increasing within society, external enemies have intensified their attack.... Communism, Islam, Christianity have powerful international links... their World-Centres. Commu-nists have their Comintern working overtly or covertly." By 1987, Ram Swarup ought to have known that the Comintern was dissolved on May 22, 1943 and that the "Islamic International, a kind of Muslim Vatican, Rabitah al'-alam al-Iscaniya" (Muslim World League) is a Saudi-sponsored non-governmental organisation (1962) which counts for little in India. Hindus, by comparison, are at a disadvantage, he moans. "They do not even have a government of their own." Socially, they are falling prey to "vulgarity"; that is, "gambling, drinking, vulgar film music... Cinemas (sic) are becoming great moral and social pollutants."
ANU PUSHKARNAThe Christian missionary centre at Nawapara in Jhabua district, Madhya Pradesh, where four nuns were gangraped on September 23.
So, combat these and go over to the offensive and "look at Islam, Christianity and Communism... from the Hindu angle." Sikhs are not spared. Ram Swarup adopts a dual approach in Hindu-Sikh Relationship (1985). He woos them as "the members of Hindu society" and denounces them for thinking that "they were different". Base motives are freely attributed: "Thanks to the Green Revolution and various other factors, the Sikhs have become relatively more rich and prosperous. No wonder, they have begun to find that the Hindu bond is not good enough for them and they seek a new identity readily available to them in their names and outer symbols. This is an understandable human frailty."
He defends the storming of the Golden Temple. It "became an arsenal, a fort, a sanctuary for criminals. This grave situation called for necessary action which caused some unavoidable damage to the building." There followed "protest meetings, resolutions", which he deprecates. "The whole thing created wide-spread resentment all over India which burst into a most unwholesome violence when Mrs. Indira Gandhi was assassinated. The befoggers have again got busy and they explain the whole tragedy in terms of collusion between the politicians and the police. But this conspiracy theory cannot explain the range and the virulence of the tragedy. A growing resentment at the arrogant Akali politics is the main cause of this fearful happening."
This is of a piece with the Organiser's defence of Mahatma Gandhi's assassination in its editorial (January 11, 1970) - "turned the people's wrath on himself." Its editor then, K.R. Malkani, is now vice-president of the BJP.
SITA RAM GOEL does not lag behind. His pamphlet "Hindu Society under Siege" (1981) paints a frightening future: "The death of Hindu society is no longer an eventuality which cannot be envisaged. This great society is now besieged by the same dark and deadly forces which have overwhelmed and obliterated many ancient societies. Suffering from a loss of its elan, it has become a house divided within itself... Hindu society is in mortal danger as never before."
One is reminded of the loonies of California, the minutemen who lived in dread of a Soviet conquest of the U.S. The familiar ghosts of old are revived - "Islamism", "Christianism" and a new one to keep them company, "Macaulay-ism" (the educated Hindu who rejects the Parivar's voodoo credo and the mumbo-jumbo of its shrill rhetoric).
"Ideologically, Communism in India is, in several respects, a sort of extension of Macaulayism, a residue of British rule. That is why Communism is strongest today in those areas where Macaulayism had spread its widest spell." In no other parts of the country, though, are Indian languages and culture more highly respected than in West Bengal and Kerala. "Macaulayism is wedded to Secularism and Democracy. It has to find out for itself as to who are the enemies of Secularism and Democracy and who their best friends. This can be done only by looking beyond the United Front of Islamism, Communism and Christianism."
In the U.S., the minutemen belonged to the lunatic fringe. In India, the Parivar's ideology is espoused by the party in power, even if it be through dubious alliances. Scruples are not the Parivar's strongpoint. On April 4, 1980, L.K. Advani and A.B. Vajpayee endorsed a formulation in the National Executive of the Janata Party which pledged its members to accept "unconditionally and strive to preserve the composite culture and secular state established in our country." After splitting the Janata Party both rejected the concept of India's "composite culture." On April 8, 1998, at the BJP's Agra session, its then president, Advani, denounced the concept of composite culture - just as the Jan Sangh had done in December 1969.
HARSH NARAIN was a Visiting Professor at Aligarh Muslim University and Reader at the North-Eastern Hill University. His Myths of Composite Cultural and Equality of Religions (1990) reveals the unspoken thoughts of the Parivar; the sub-text beneath the avowed text.
"Mere permanent settlement in a country does not entitle a plunderer to be looked upon as indigenous. It must first be seen whose interests he is out to serve. What is his attitude towards Indians? Take an example. European settlers entered America and ruined the original inhabitants, whom they named 'Red Indians'. To expect the remaining Red Indians to regard their European-born rulers as equally indigenous would be a cruel joke beyond their understanding.
"Islam was out to deal a death blow to the equilibrium, exuberance, and cosmopolitan character of Indian humanity, later designated as Hindu culture in juxtaposition to Indian culture."
To him, the Taj and the Qutub Minar are specimens exclusively of Muslim, not Indian, sculpture. For, he holds: "The Muslims have been religiously indifferent to, if not contemptuous of, Indian sculpture. Thanks to the taste of the Sufis, the Muslims took some fancy to Indian music. The main gamut of Indian literature has also been untinged with Muslim literature and historic-cultural allusions... Urdu language and literature, the much-vaunted symbols or vehicles of composite culture, are not the result of intermingling of Hinduism and Islam but reflected the Muslim image in Indian garb... nor have the Hindu heroes and servants been fortunate enough to be honoured by the Muslim community."
This can only be deliberate falsehood, since he flaunts familiarity with Urdu. The much-maligned Iqbal wrote whole poems in praise of the Buddha, Ram, Guru Nanak, and Swami Ram Tirtha. He was an admirer of the Sanskrit poet, Bhartruhari, and had drunk deep at the fount of the Gita and the Upanishads. Another great poet, Maulana Hasrat Mohani, a confirmed leftist, wrote nostalgically of the soil of Mathura and in praise of Krishna. He was also an ardent admirer of Bal Gangadhar Tilak. But this is understandable of one who stoops to libel one of the greatest mystics and martyrs of all time, Mansur al-Hallaj. He was beheaded and his life forms the subject of the feat of scholarship, Louis Massignon's four-volume The Passion of al-Hallaj. He is accused of converting to Islam "the Dudwalas and Pinjaris of Gujarat." No authority is cited in support of the charge.
Harsh Narain holds that while "a sizable section of the Sufis had been comparatively free from the proverbial emphasis on coercion ... the role of Sufi tradition in bridging the gulf between Islam and Hinduism or laying the foundations of a composite culture has been greatly exaggerated."
All this and more only in order to expose "the mad propaganda of composite culture" and to prove that "Muslim culture cannot be said to be an integral part of Indian culture and must be regarded as an anticulture or counter culture in our body politic." This is no different from the RSS chief's demand (November 22, 1998) that the minorities Hinduise themselves.
The author turns his attention to Jainism ("failed to develop any cultural identity of its own") and Buddhism ("basically a life-negating religion, having little interest in social order, strictly speaking"). Conclusion? "Our national culture, Indian culture, is a unity describable as Aryan culture, Hindu culture... Indian culture is Hindu culture... Muslim and Christian cultures are counter-cultures." And Parsi culture is "something like" a sub-culture.
So "Hindu culture alone deserves the credit of recognition as the national culture (abhimanin) of this country, as the culture owning and possessing this great nation, along with other Indian-born cultures like Buddhist and Jain cultures as its sub-cultures; Muslim and Christian cultures being in the nature of tenant-cultures. The distinction of master-possessor-owner culture and tenant-parasitic culture has its own significance." One can guess what he is hinting at.
Sita Ram Goel writes in the same vein. His ardour is reflected in his three books Catholic Ashrams, Papacy and History of Hindu-Christian Encounters (304-1996). His preface to the second edition (1996) of the book on Hindu-Christian encounters explains a lot: "The Sangh Parivar, which had turned cold towards Hindu causes over the years, was startled by the rout of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 1984 elections, and decided to renew its Hindu character. The Ramajanmabhumi Movement was the result. The Movement was aimed at arresting Islamic aggression. Christianity or its missions were hardly mentioned. Nevertheless, it was Christianity which showed the greatest concern at this new Hindu stir, and started crying 'wolf'. Its media power in the West raised a storm, saying that Hindus were out to destroy the minorities in India and impose a Nazi regime. The storm is still raging and no one knows when it will subside, if at all." Thus "the storm" was unleashed for reasons of power through election victories.
Goel's writings alone prove that the Parivar's ire against Christians is decades old. In an article published in March 1983 he had asserted that the ancient Hindu precept sarva dharma samabhava (all religions are equal) should not be applied to Christians or Muslims.
IT is with some hesitation that one turns to Goel's book Jesus Christ: An Artifice for Aggression (1994); so wantonly offensive it is. The focus now is not on the missionaries, or politics, or history. The target is the faith itself; Christianity as a religion. Why? Because hitherto "we Hindus have remained occupied with the behaviour patterns of Muslims and Christians and not with the belief systems which create those behaviour patterns. We object to Christian missions, but refuse to discuss Christianity and its God, Jesus. We object to Islamic terrorisms, but refuse to have a look at Islamic and its prophet, Muhammad. I see no sense or logic in this Hindu habit."
Is there any other country in the world where such theses are written for such a purpose? One wonders. "Now, I could see why the history of Christianity had been what it had been. The source of the poison was in the Jesus of the gospels."
The Immaculate Conception of Virgin Mary is attacked wantonly. There are chapters on Jesus of history, of fiction and of faith. The thesis? He did not exist in history. "The quantum of crimes committed by Muhammad's Islam was only slightly smaller than that of the crimes committed by the Christianity of the Jesus Christ... The parallel between Jesus and Hitler was seen as still more striking. The Nazi creed, as laid down by Hitler, did not sound much different from the Christian creed as preached by Jesus in the gospels."
Goel is dismayed to find that Jesus Christ "should continue to retain his hallow" (sic) in India. "Christianity is accepted as a religion not only by the westernised Hindu elite but also by Hindu saints, scholars, and political platforms."
Jesus Christ has been "praised to the skies, particularly by Mahatma Gandhi." But, "it is high time for Hindus to learn that Jesus Christ symbolises no spiritual power, or moral uprightness. He is no more than an artifice for legitimising wanton imperialist aggression. The aggressors have found him to be highly profitable so far. By the same token, Hindus should know that Jesus means nothing but mischief for their country and culture. The West where he flourished for long, has discarded him as junk. There is no reason why Hindus should buy him. He is the type of junk that cannot be re-cycled. He can only poison the environment."
THE virulence of the language reveals the depths of the hatred. This is what Indians are up against - a powerful hate group, enjoying the patronage of many politicians in power and in the administration, which is out to wipe out all traces not only of secularism and democracy but of religious tolerance, religious and cultural diversity and, indeed, of decency itself from India.
It shall not come to pass. The answer lies not in forging a united front of the minorities; it lies in a renewal of the secular ideal in our politics and in the nation at large.
India's National MagazineFrom the publishers of THE HINDU
Vol. 15 :: No. 26 :: Dec. 19, 1998 - Jan. 01, 1999
COLUMN
RSS and Christians
The Sangh Parivar's violent hatred against Christianity is deep-rooted and decades old, as is the case with its animosity against several other communities.
A. G. NOORANI
ON December 4, 1998, nearly 23 million Christians across the country observed a protest day demanding that the governments at the Centre and in the States check the growing violence against members of the community. A letter of protest, drawn up by the United Christians' Forum for Human Rights (UCFHR), said: "Since January 1998 there has been more violence against the Christian community than in all the 50 years of the country's Independence. Nuns have been raped, priests executed, Bibles burnt, churches demolished, educational institutions destroyed and religious people harassed." This is persecution in the strict dictionary meaning of the word "pursue with enmity and ill-treatment". Mabel Rebello of the Congress(I) told the Rajya Sabha that day that "50 per cent of these (incidents) have occurred in Gujarat where the BJP is in power".
On October 8, Gujarat's Director-General of Police, C.P. Singh, confirmed in an interview to Teesta Setalvad, co-editor of Communalism Combat (October 1998): "One thing was clear in the pattern of incidents. It was the activists of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal who were taking the law into their own hands, which posed a serious danger to peace in Gujarat. Many of the attacks on the minorities were after these organisations had whipped up local passions of conversions (by Christian missionaries) and allegedly forced inter-religious marriages... our investigations revealed that in most cases these were entirely baseless allegations."
Two disturbing features of the campaign stand out in bold relief. One is that the attacks mounted steeply after the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Government assumed office in March 1998. The Archbishop of Delhi, Alan de Lastic, said: "What I have noticed is that ever since this Government came to power at the Centre, the attacks on Christians and Christian missionaries have increased" (Sunday, November 22). The other is the Government's wilful refusal to condemn them. Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's remarks on December 5 were virtually forced out of him. Union Home Minister L.K. Advani has been false to his oath of office ("do right to all manner of people in accordance with the Constitution and the law without fear or favour, affection or ill-will"). He said in Baroda on August 2 (The Hindu, August 3): "There is no law and order problem in Gujarat." Three days later the DGP said, according to The Hindustan Times (August 6), that "the VHP and the Bajrang Dal were taking the law into their own hands." He also said that incidents of communal violence had increased manifold over the last few months; recently the crime rate in the State had increased by as much as 9.6 per cent. On an average, 39 crimes of serious nature like murder, rape and dacoity were reported in the State every day." A member of the investigation team sent by the Minorities Commission revealed: "After initial reluctance, the officials named VHP and Bajrang Dal allegedly involved in the mob attacks on Christians and Muslims" (The Indian Express, August 12). Advani's certificate of good conduct speaks for itself.
Christians did not rush to register their protest, as they did on December 4, but for long kept pleading for succour. On October 1, the national secretary of the All India Catholic Union (AICU), John Dayal, pointedly remarked: "The AICU is surprised that Union Government and members of the ruling coalition, including the BJP, have not come out categorically in denouncing the violence against Christians."
The Bajrang Dal has threatened Christian-run educational institutions in Karnataka with dire consequences if they did not "Hinduise" them. Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh leader Rajendra Singh declared at an RSS camp in Meerut on November 22: "Muslims and Christians will have to accept Hindu culture as their own if Hindus are to treat them as Indians" (an Agence France Presse: report in The Asian Age; November 23). The UCFHR bitterly complained in an open letter published on November 19: "The state has failed to do its duty in protecting the life, dignity and property of the victims. At many places, it seems as if the Centre and the State governments have tacitly supported the communal groups. How is it otherwise that the State governments have not taken any action against the virulent and anti-national statements of the VHP, RSS, Jagran Manch and Bajrang Dal?" (emphasis added, throughout).
While the Sangh Parivar's animosity towards Muslims is well-known, its attitude towards Christians has taken many people by surprise. But, Vishwa Hindu Parishad general secretary Giriraj Kishore said in Chandigarh on November 25: "Today the Christians constitute a greater threat than the collective threat from separatist Muslim elements." Describing G. S. Tohra, president of the Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee, as a "separatist", he said, "all minorities including Muslims and Christians must accept that their ancestors were Hindus." Ergo, they must all return to the Hindu fold.
Violence in speech inevitably inspires violent acts. As the Jaganmohan Reddy Commission that went into the Ahmedabad riots (1969) noted, once communal tension is created in a city, all that is needed is "only a match to set on fire and a fan to fan the city ablaze." Riots erupt over trifling incidents only because the atmosphere has been fouled up. Hence, the need for "a proper appreciation of the communal atmosphere in a State, in a town or in any particular area," the Commission stressed. Those who spread hate are the real perpetrators of violence. The ones who wield the weapon are their mindless agents.
We have tended to ignore a fact that brooks no neglect - the real cause of the communal riots is the rise of the Sangh Parivar. There was communal peace even in the early years after Partition. A Home Ministry review presented to the National Integration Council in 1968 noted: "From 1954 to 1960, there was a clear and consistent downward trend, 1960 being a remarkably good year with only 26 communal incidents in the whole country. This trend was sharply reversed in 1961. "That was when riots erupted in Jabalpur - thanks to the Jan Sangh, the BJP's ancestor. Communal violence has not "looked back" since.
Justice P. Venugopal, a former Judge of the Madras High Court, who inquired into Hindu-Christian clashes in Kanyakumari district in March 1982, noted: "The RSS adopts a militant and aggressive attitude and sets itself as the champion of what it considers to be the rights of Hindus against minorities. It has taken upon itself the task to teach the minority their place and if they are not willing to learn their place, teach them a lesson. The RSS has given respectability to communalism and communal riots and demoralise administration (sic). The RSS methodology for provoking communal violence is: (a) rousing communal feelings in the majority community by the propaganda that Christians are not loyal citizens of this country..." Report after report has indicted the RSS specifically or its affiliates (Ahmedabad 1969; Bhiwandi 1970; Tellicherry 1971; Jamshedpur 1981; and Mumbai 1993).
VIOLENCE is an integral part of the RSS credo. "It should be used as a surgeon's knife... to cure the society... Sometimes to protect non-violence itself violence becomes necessary," RSS leader M.S. Golwalkar said in 1952. (Spotlights: Guruji Answers, pages 110 and 188). In his fine work India as a Secular State, Donald Eugene Smith recalled the desecration of a church in Bihar in 1955 and the almost total destruction in 1957 of the Gass Memorial Centre at Raipur.
V.D. Savarkar wrote repeatedly in his book Hindutva (1923): "Hindutva is different from Hinduism." For once, he was right. Hinduism is a great religion, it is ancient. Hindutva is an ideology of hate. It is recent. He grouped Muslims and Christians together as ones who do not share "the tie of the common homage we pay to our great civilisation - our Hindu culture." He added: "Christian and Mohammedan communities who were but very recently Hindus... cannot be recognised as Hindus as since their adoption of the new cult they had ceased to own Hindu civilisation (Sanskriti) as a whole... For though Hindusthan to them is Fatherland, as to any other Hindu, yet it is not to them a Holyland too. Their holyland is far off in Arabia or Palestine."
They are not the only offenders: "Look at the Jews; neither centuries of prosperity nor sense of gratitude for the shelter they found can make them more attached or even equally attached to the several countries they inhabit."
Golwalkar revealed on May 15, 1963 that his first book We or Our Nationhood Defined was based on Savarkar's brother Babarao's book in Marathi on the same theme, Rashtra Mimamsa. Golwalkar's second book, Bunch of Thoughts, praised the book Hindutva and amplified its ideology. The BJP has used it as a political weapon with dangerous consequences. Chapter XII of Bunch of Thoughts is devoted to three "Internal Threats" - Muslims, Christians and the Communists. Of the first two he wrote: "Together with the change in their faith, gone are the spirit of love and devotion for the nation. Nor does it end there. They have also developed a feeling of identification with the enemies of this land. They look to some foreign lands as their holy places." They are asked to return to the Hindu fold.
Not that that will be of much help. "For a Hindu, he gets the first sanskar when he is still in his mother's womb... We are, therefore, born as Hindus. About the others, they are born to this world as simple unnamed human beings and later on, either circumcised or baptised, they become Muslims or Christians." The hatred is unconcealed. They have no right to proselytise. Hindus alone have it, for, "returning to one's ancestral faith is not conversion at all, it is merely home-coming."
Bunch of Thoughts first appeared in 1966 but the good work has been stepped up since. To the three "internal threats", a fourth is added - "Nehruism" - and among the perils we face is "Macaulayism". In Delhi functions an outfit, Voice of India, which proclaims: "We are not general booksellers and handle only books listed in this catalogue. Please do not ask for other books." It is an outfit with a mission. For the catalogue has an "appeal" which reads thus: "Hindu society and culture are faced with a crisis. There is a united front of entrenched alien forces - Islam, Christianity, Communism, Nehruism - to disrupt and discredit the perennial values of the Indian ethos. All who care for India need to know what is happening, and what is to be done if a major tragedy is to be averted. Voice of India aims at providing an ideological defence of Hindu society and culture, through a series of publications."
SOME people were surprised by Advani's assertion at a seminar on November 6 at Sarnath that "the Buddha did not announce any new religion. He was only restating with a new emphasis the ancient ideals of the Indo-Aryan civilisation." The Buddha, he added, derived his teaching from the Bhagvad Gita and was an avatar of Vishnu. Rebuttals from Buddhists were swift and sharp (see "Hindutva's fallacies and fantasies", Frontline, December 4, 1998).
However, no one familiar with the stuff churned out by this factory, for over four decades, would have been surprised. Its literature is intolerant of any cultural and religious diversity. It fosters a siege mentality among Hindus and speaks disparagingly of all others - not excluding Sikhs and Jews. That is not all. A Hindu who does not share its bigotry is attacked as being "anti-Hindu". Its literature represents the spirit, outlook and ethos of the Sangh Parivar. The writings cited below reveal a revolting virulence. Its moving spirit is one Sita Ram Goel.
The Parivar's organ Organiser only recently (October 18, 1998) published a paper he had written in 1983. He wrote: "The English-educated Hindu elite which controls the commanding heights in government, educational institutions and mass media has failed the test either because it has become indifferent to Hindu society, as a result of having imbibed the current cosmopolitan culture, or because it has been trained to look at Hindu society through eyes which are not of its own ancestral culture and, as a result, has become sceptical about, if not actually hostile to, the merits of Hindu society. This desperate situation has been made more difficult by a degenerate politics through which vote-hungry, sloganised, short-sighted and nominally Hindu politicians weaken Hindu society by dividing it on the basis of caste, sect, language and region, disarm Hindu society by sanctimonious and one-sided appeals in the name of traditional Hindu tolerance, strengthen alienated and aggressive communities by supporting their separatist demands in the name of secularism." His intolerance brings all within the sway of his indictment, bar the Parivar itself.
TO return to Advani's notions on Buddhism, a pamphlet entitled "Buddhism vis-a-vis Hinduism" published 40 years ago by Ram Swarup for the outfit asserts: "Buddha, his spiritual experiences and teachings, formed part of a Hindu tradition... A good Buddhist has perforce to be a good Hindu too." He went on to attack "foreign" religions. "The indigenous religions of the countries of the two Americas have been completely overwhelmed. In the African sub-continent (sic) the local religions are under a systematic attack from Islamic and Christian ideologies." The Parivar takes a dim view of the United States.
Golwalkar was asked in July 1967: "What is your opinion about present-day America?" There was lot to comment about - racial conflict, Vietnam policy, and so on. All he could say was: "Do you not yourself see that the American youth is fast dissipating himself in all kinds of sensual indulgence?" Simplistic, sweeping, defamatory judgment comes easily to the tribe.
Ram Swarup's tract Hinduism vis-a-vis Christianity and Islam continued his refrain about "native" faiths. "What is happening in India is also happening elsewhere. In America even the vestiges of once (sic), a rich spiritual culture of the Indians, is no more." He developed the theme in its sequel Hindu View of Christianity and Islam (1992). "The two ideologies have been active and systematic persecutors of pagan nations, cultures and religions... We have spoken here with sympathy and respect not only of pagan Americas and Africa but also of the pagan past of Egypt, Greece, Rome, Iran, Syria and Arabia." V.S. Naipaul is in good company with the Sangh Parivar. Unlike him, it indicts Christianity as well as Islam on this score.
"Hinduism can help all peoples seeking religious self-renewal, for it preserves in some way their old Gods and religions, it preserves in its various layers religious traditions and intuitions they have lost. Many countries now under Christianity and Islam had once great religions; they also had great Gods who adequately fulfilled their spiritual and ethical needs... during the long period of neglect, they lost the knowledge which could revive those Gods, Hinduism can help them with this knowledge. In its simplest aspect, Europeans can best study their old pre-Christian religion by studying Hinduism."
Ram Swarup goes on to quote approvingly: "Gore Vidal says that from a 'barbaric Bronze Age text known as Old Testament, three anti-human religions have evolved - Judaism, Christianity and Islam'; he also calls them 'sky-god religions'."
Ram Swarup damns all three religions as "great persecutors". The Hindu response of old was wrong. He writes:
"First, they tried to 'reform' themselves and be like their rulers... One God, a revealed Book and prophets.... The Brahmo Samaj, the Arya Samaj, and the Akalis also claimed monotheism and iconoclasm ... in the case of the Akalis, the new look has also become the basis of a new separatist-militant politics....
"The second way the Hindus adopted was that of 'synthesis'. The synthesizers claimed that all religions preach the same thing. They found in the Bible and the Quran all the truths of the Upanishads and vice versa. They culled passages from various scriptures to prove their point... It is by such methods that they proved that the Bible and the Quran were no different from the Upanishads...."
The wrath wells up as he proceeds and delivers a message which explains why the country has had to undergo what it has all these years, especially since 1990: "India became politically free in 1947, but it is ruled by anti-Hindu Hindus. The old mental slavery continues and it has yet to win its cultural and intellectual independence. India is entering into the second phase of its freedom struggle; the struggle for regaining its Hindu identity. The new struggle is as difficult as the old one. Hindus are disorganised, self-alienated, morally and ideologically disarmed. They lack leadership; the Hindu elites have become illiterate about their spiritual heritage and history and indifferent and even hostile towards their religion... India's higher education, its academia and media are in the hands of a Hindu-hating elite."
Note what Ram Swarup has to say of the caste system:
"Once when Hinduism was strong, castes represented a natural and healthy diversity, but now in its present state of weakness these are used for its dismemberment. Old vested interests joined by new ones have come together to make use of the caste factor in a big way in order to keep Hindus down.
"Hindus have been kept down too long. Everyone including the victims think that it is the natural order of things. Therefore, now when the Hindu society is showing some signs of stir, there is a great consternation. Already a cry has gone out of Hindu fundamentalism, we must expect more of it in future." The readers have been warned. But India will not be the only country to be saved. "America is awaiting to be rediscovered in a characteristically Hindu way, not the Christian way".
THIS represents a worse-than-narrow world-view. It is redolent of the bigotry of medieval times. This book was published in 1992. His earlier pamphlet, "Cultural Self-Alienation and Some Problems Hinduism Faces", also characterised "castes and denominations" as expressing a "natural and healthy diversity". The ignorance is astounding. "To Marx, the British conquest of India was a blessing." Hinduism faces attacks "both from inside and outside. While the forces of self-alienation are increasing within society, external enemies have intensified their attack.... Communism, Islam, Christianity have powerful international links... their World-Centres. Commu-nists have their Comintern working overtly or covertly." By 1987, Ram Swarup ought to have known that the Comintern was dissolved on May 22, 1943 and that the "Islamic International, a kind of Muslim Vatican, Rabitah al'-alam al-Iscaniya" (Muslim World League) is a Saudi-sponsored non-governmental organisation (1962) which counts for little in India. Hindus, by comparison, are at a disadvantage, he moans. "They do not even have a government of their own." Socially, they are falling prey to "vulgarity"; that is, "gambling, drinking, vulgar film music... Cinemas (sic) are becoming great moral and social pollutants."
ANU PUSHKARNAThe Christian missionary centre at Nawapara in Jhabua district, Madhya Pradesh, where four nuns were gangraped on September 23.
So, combat these and go over to the offensive and "look at Islam, Christianity and Communism... from the Hindu angle." Sikhs are not spared. Ram Swarup adopts a dual approach in Hindu-Sikh Relationship (1985). He woos them as "the members of Hindu society" and denounces them for thinking that "they were different". Base motives are freely attributed: "Thanks to the Green Revolution and various other factors, the Sikhs have become relatively more rich and prosperous. No wonder, they have begun to find that the Hindu bond is not good enough for them and they seek a new identity readily available to them in their names and outer symbols. This is an understandable human frailty."
He defends the storming of the Golden Temple. It "became an arsenal, a fort, a sanctuary for criminals. This grave situation called for necessary action which caused some unavoidable damage to the building." There followed "protest meetings, resolutions", which he deprecates. "The whole thing created wide-spread resentment all over India which burst into a most unwholesome violence when Mrs. Indira Gandhi was assassinated. The befoggers have again got busy and they explain the whole tragedy in terms of collusion between the politicians and the police. But this conspiracy theory cannot explain the range and the virulence of the tragedy. A growing resentment at the arrogant Akali politics is the main cause of this fearful happening."
This is of a piece with the Organiser's defence of Mahatma Gandhi's assassination in its editorial (January 11, 1970) - "turned the people's wrath on himself." Its editor then, K.R. Malkani, is now vice-president of the BJP.
SITA RAM GOEL does not lag behind. His pamphlet "Hindu Society under Siege" (1981) paints a frightening future: "The death of Hindu society is no longer an eventuality which cannot be envisaged. This great society is now besieged by the same dark and deadly forces which have overwhelmed and obliterated many ancient societies. Suffering from a loss of its elan, it has become a house divided within itself... Hindu society is in mortal danger as never before."
One is reminded of the loonies of California, the minutemen who lived in dread of a Soviet conquest of the U.S. The familiar ghosts of old are revived - "Islamism", "Christianism" and a new one to keep them company, "Macaulay-ism" (the educated Hindu who rejects the Parivar's voodoo credo and the mumbo-jumbo of its shrill rhetoric).
"Ideologically, Communism in India is, in several respects, a sort of extension of Macaulayism, a residue of British rule. That is why Communism is strongest today in those areas where Macaulayism had spread its widest spell." In no other parts of the country, though, are Indian languages and culture more highly respected than in West Bengal and Kerala. "Macaulayism is wedded to Secularism and Democracy. It has to find out for itself as to who are the enemies of Secularism and Democracy and who their best friends. This can be done only by looking beyond the United Front of Islamism, Communism and Christianism."
In the U.S., the minutemen belonged to the lunatic fringe. In India, the Parivar's ideology is espoused by the party in power, even if it be through dubious alliances. Scruples are not the Parivar's strongpoint. On April 4, 1980, L.K. Advani and A.B. Vajpayee endorsed a formulation in the National Executive of the Janata Party which pledged its members to accept "unconditionally and strive to preserve the composite culture and secular state established in our country." After splitting the Janata Party both rejected the concept of India's "composite culture." On April 8, 1998, at the BJP's Agra session, its then president, Advani, denounced the concept of composite culture - just as the Jan Sangh had done in December 1969.
HARSH NARAIN was a Visiting Professor at Aligarh Muslim University and Reader at the North-Eastern Hill University. His Myths of Composite Cultural and Equality of Religions (1990) reveals the unspoken thoughts of the Parivar; the sub-text beneath the avowed text.
"Mere permanent settlement in a country does not entitle a plunderer to be looked upon as indigenous. It must first be seen whose interests he is out to serve. What is his attitude towards Indians? Take an example. European settlers entered America and ruined the original inhabitants, whom they named 'Red Indians'. To expect the remaining Red Indians to regard their European-born rulers as equally indigenous would be a cruel joke beyond their understanding.
"Islam was out to deal a death blow to the equilibrium, exuberance, and cosmopolitan character of Indian humanity, later designated as Hindu culture in juxtaposition to Indian culture."
To him, the Taj and the Qutub Minar are specimens exclusively of Muslim, not Indian, sculpture. For, he holds: "The Muslims have been religiously indifferent to, if not contemptuous of, Indian sculpture. Thanks to the taste of the Sufis, the Muslims took some fancy to Indian music. The main gamut of Indian literature has also been untinged with Muslim literature and historic-cultural allusions... Urdu language and literature, the much-vaunted symbols or vehicles of composite culture, are not the result of intermingling of Hinduism and Islam but reflected the Muslim image in Indian garb... nor have the Hindu heroes and servants been fortunate enough to be honoured by the Muslim community."
This can only be deliberate falsehood, since he flaunts familiarity with Urdu. The much-maligned Iqbal wrote whole poems in praise of the Buddha, Ram, Guru Nanak, and Swami Ram Tirtha. He was an admirer of the Sanskrit poet, Bhartruhari, and had drunk deep at the fount of the Gita and the Upanishads. Another great poet, Maulana Hasrat Mohani, a confirmed leftist, wrote nostalgically of the soil of Mathura and in praise of Krishna. He was also an ardent admirer of Bal Gangadhar Tilak. But this is understandable of one who stoops to libel one of the greatest mystics and martyrs of all time, Mansur al-Hallaj. He was beheaded and his life forms the subject of the feat of scholarship, Louis Massignon's four-volume The Passion of al-Hallaj. He is accused of converting to Islam "the Dudwalas and Pinjaris of Gujarat." No authority is cited in support of the charge.
Harsh Narain holds that while "a sizable section of the Sufis had been comparatively free from the proverbial emphasis on coercion ... the role of Sufi tradition in bridging the gulf between Islam and Hinduism or laying the foundations of a composite culture has been greatly exaggerated."
All this and more only in order to expose "the mad propaganda of composite culture" and to prove that "Muslim culture cannot be said to be an integral part of Indian culture and must be regarded as an anticulture or counter culture in our body politic." This is no different from the RSS chief's demand (November 22, 1998) that the minorities Hinduise themselves.
The author turns his attention to Jainism ("failed to develop any cultural identity of its own") and Buddhism ("basically a life-negating religion, having little interest in social order, strictly speaking"). Conclusion? "Our national culture, Indian culture, is a unity describable as Aryan culture, Hindu culture... Indian culture is Hindu culture... Muslim and Christian cultures are counter-cultures." And Parsi culture is "something like" a sub-culture.
So "Hindu culture alone deserves the credit of recognition as the national culture (abhimanin) of this country, as the culture owning and possessing this great nation, along with other Indian-born cultures like Buddhist and Jain cultures as its sub-cultures; Muslim and Christian cultures being in the nature of tenant-cultures. The distinction of master-possessor-owner culture and tenant-parasitic culture has its own significance." One can guess what he is hinting at.
Sita Ram Goel writes in the same vein. His ardour is reflected in his three books Catholic Ashrams, Papacy and History of Hindu-Christian Encounters (304-1996). His preface to the second edition (1996) of the book on Hindu-Christian encounters explains a lot: "The Sangh Parivar, which had turned cold towards Hindu causes over the years, was startled by the rout of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the 1984 elections, and decided to renew its Hindu character. The Ramajanmabhumi Movement was the result. The Movement was aimed at arresting Islamic aggression. Christianity or its missions were hardly mentioned. Nevertheless, it was Christianity which showed the greatest concern at this new Hindu stir, and started crying 'wolf'. Its media power in the West raised a storm, saying that Hindus were out to destroy the minorities in India and impose a Nazi regime. The storm is still raging and no one knows when it will subside, if at all." Thus "the storm" was unleashed for reasons of power through election victories.
Goel's writings alone prove that the Parivar's ire against Christians is decades old. In an article published in March 1983 he had asserted that the ancient Hindu precept sarva dharma samabhava (all religions are equal) should not be applied to Christians or Muslims.
IT is with some hesitation that one turns to Goel's book Jesus Christ: An Artifice for Aggression (1994); so wantonly offensive it is. The focus now is not on the missionaries, or politics, or history. The target is the faith itself; Christianity as a religion. Why? Because hitherto "we Hindus have remained occupied with the behaviour patterns of Muslims and Christians and not with the belief systems which create those behaviour patterns. We object to Christian missions, but refuse to discuss Christianity and its God, Jesus. We object to Islamic terrorisms, but refuse to have a look at Islamic and its prophet, Muhammad. I see no sense or logic in this Hindu habit."
Is there any other country in the world where such theses are written for such a purpose? One wonders. "Now, I could see why the history of Christianity had been what it had been. The source of the poison was in the Jesus of the gospels."
The Immaculate Conception of Virgin Mary is attacked wantonly. There are chapters on Jesus of history, of fiction and of faith. The thesis? He did not exist in history. "The quantum of crimes committed by Muhammad's Islam was only slightly smaller than that of the crimes committed by the Christianity of the Jesus Christ... The parallel between Jesus and Hitler was seen as still more striking. The Nazi creed, as laid down by Hitler, did not sound much different from the Christian creed as preached by Jesus in the gospels."
Goel is dismayed to find that Jesus Christ "should continue to retain his hallow" (sic) in India. "Christianity is accepted as a religion not only by the westernised Hindu elite but also by Hindu saints, scholars, and political platforms."
Jesus Christ has been "praised to the skies, particularly by Mahatma Gandhi." But, "it is high time for Hindus to learn that Jesus Christ symbolises no spiritual power, or moral uprightness. He is no more than an artifice for legitimising wanton imperialist aggression. The aggressors have found him to be highly profitable so far. By the same token, Hindus should know that Jesus means nothing but mischief for their country and culture. The West where he flourished for long, has discarded him as junk. There is no reason why Hindus should buy him. He is the type of junk that cannot be re-cycled. He can only poison the environment."
THE virulence of the language reveals the depths of the hatred. This is what Indians are up against - a powerful hate group, enjoying the patronage of many politicians in power and in the administration, which is out to wipe out all traces not only of secularism and democracy but of religious tolerance, religious and cultural diversity and, indeed, of decency itself from India.
It shall not come to pass. The answer lies not in forging a united front of the minorities; it lies in a renewal of the secular ideal in our politics and in the nation at large.
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