Muslims in India: Torn Between Being Other & Being Indigenously Loyal
By
Mushtaq Ul Haq Ahmad Sikander, New Age Islam
12 July
2023
Watan
Mey Gaair: Hindustani Musalman (Being The Other: The Muslim In India)
Author:
Saeed Naqvi
Translator:
Mahmood Faizabadi
Publisher:
Pharos Media & Publishing Pvt Ltd, New Delhi, India
Year
of Publication: 2018
Pages:
290 Price: Rs 300
ISBN:
9788172211035
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Muslims in
India are facing existential crisis. They are decried as traitors and on a
little provocation the Hindu majority calls for their exodus to Pakistan or
silencing them by death sending them to graveyards. The communal slogan Musalmanu
Kye Dou Asthan: Pakistan ya Qabristan (Indian Muslims have only two
destinations: Pakistan or Graveyard). Indian Muslims time and again have to
prove themselves that they are the loyal citizens of India. The Hindutva fringe
elements have got so emboldened by the silence of majority, that they want Muslims
time and again to prove their loyalty towards India, by chanting Bharat Mata Ki
Jai (Long Live Mother India) and Jai Shree Ram (Hail Lord Ram). For the
Hindutva elements Muslims cannot be loyal citizens as they have rendered Hindu
religion synonymous with the being patriotic. For the ideologues of Hindutva, Muslims
and Christians can never be loyal citizens of India, because they do not
consider India as a holy land. Now when these fringe elements have captured
power, as BJP is the political wing of one such Hindutva group RSS, so the
daily lives of Muslims have become more cumbersome and vulnerable.
Saeed Naqvi
is a veteran journalist and political commentator. His writings are regularly
published in newspapers, journals, magazines and websites of national and
international repute. Naqvi has now come out with a book, which in his own
words deliberates about Muslim existence in India today. “This book does not
claim to be a comprehensive history of the Muslim in India, not is it a
political history of Islam in the subcontinent. Rather, it is a chronicle of my
growing disillusionment and disappointment with the direction in which the
country is heading, filtered through my own experiences and observations of key
events in recent Indian history.” (P-xv) If he as a Muslim elite is
disappointed and disillusioned with the state of affairs in India, what can be
the experiences of a common Muslim in India. The Muslim masses in India are the
most marginalized and disempowered community in India today. Their pain and
anguish are unreported, because they are not literate enough and cannot express
themselves in English language. If an elite person like Naqvi can feel that the
things are not going good for the country and particularly Muslims, what can be
sentiments of a disempowered Muslim on ground.
This book
is an engrossing read, and a page turner for anyone who is interested in the
understanding of Muslim lived realities in India. We find how Urdu as a
language in the post partition era was discriminated and described as a
language of Muslims only. Eid celebrations and Muharram commemorations were
manifestation of the syncretic and plural culture of India, but now that charm
has been lost. So were the carefree days when Mangoes were relished in
Mustafabad. The name of Mustafabad may soon be changed, because the new regime
wants to change everything that is associated with Muslims. Even a simple
reference to Muslims is enough to provoke the name change, but can
proselytization of names change history?
The Indian
National Congress, grew as an anti-colonial political party. Both Muslims and
Hindus participated in the anti-colonial struggle against the Britishers. There
was a strong unity between Muslims and Hindus as they were fighting a common
enemy. One can discern and substantiate this trend from this powerful writing
of Mahatma Gandhi, “In Young India of 20 October 1921, Gandhiji explained his
support for Khilafat, “I claim that with us both the Khilafat is the central
fact; with Maulana Mohammad Ali because it is his religion, with me because in
laying down my life for Khilafat, I ensure the safety of the cow, that is my
religion, from the Mussalman knife.” (P-69)
However,
the partition of Indian subcontinent, complicity of Nehru and problematic role
of Gandhi in partition, post partition stance of Congress, military operation
in Hyderabad, genocide of Muslims in Jammu through ethnic cleansing of Muslims
at the hands of Maharaja, Hindus, Sikhs and cadres of RSS rendered Muslims to
be more vulnerable and marginalized. Congress that stood for secular and
democratic values, grew cozy towards communal politics. Many times, they
collaborated with the Hindutva fringe organizations like RSS for electoral
gains. Communal and anti Muslim riots became a norm in India. The Muslims were
the greatest victims of these riots, that mostly happened during the Congress
era. The demolition of Babri masjid in 1992, and subsequent riots changed
everything for Muslims, but then Congress was able to covet them again and they
fell in their vicious trap. The communal leanings of many Congress leaders
became quite evident, but Muslims continued to ignore them. Even Rajiv Gandhi,
started his election campaign of 1989 from Ayodhya promising Ram Rajya. There
was quite an evident role of Congress Prime Minister, P V Narasimha Rao in
Babri demolition, but it is least discussed and even ignored.
In the post
Babri era, right wing government at the centre became more frequent. However,
there certainly are differences even among the right-wing parties, as
leadership matters. Hence, we witness differences between Vajpayee and Modi, as
Naqvi very well mentions, “Vajpayee had a combination of assets which qualified
him to take initiatives on Pakistan that no prime minister in post 1947 India
could have taken. He had national stature. More important, he was the tallest
leader of the Sangh Parivar-especially the RSS and the BJP. Being the
senior-most leader of the Parivar, he could, with a wave of the hand, silence
dissent. Prime Minister Modi is also from the RSS stable. But he would never
transgress red lines on Pakistan. Kashmir or Hindu-Muslim issues drawn by the
Parivar. Vajpayee could think out of the box because he had evolved. Above all,
he was a Brahmin. Modi is not-he is a Ghanchi. This will continue to matter so
long as caste remains a determinant in India’s social and political life.”
(P-168-169)
In the post
9/11 era, Islamophobia got a new lease of life. It impacted the Hindu-Muslim
relations in India adversely too. The issue of proselytization of Hindus is an
important tool in the hands of right-wing groups, to browbeat Muslims. They are
declared guilty of Love Jihad, but in reality, many Hindus convert to Islam to
escape the caste rigidity. However, the caste factor among Indian Muslims need
not to be overlooked too. Islam does not believe in caste but it is prevalent
among Indian Muslims, because many times traditions of local milieu surpass the
religious injunctions.
This book
opens up many facets and vistas of understanding the Hindu-Muslim relations in
India. The has now been translated by Mahmood Faizabadi and published in Urdu
by a reputed publisher, for a wider dissemination. This work has the potential
that it needs to be engaged, quoted and criticized. Naqvi fails to mention the
internal problems that Muslim community in India is mired with be it the
illiteracy, poverty, sectarianism, religious bigotry and victim mentality. This
work reads as both as a travelogue and memoir, as it captures essence of both
genres.
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M.H.A. Sikander is Writer-Activist based in
Srinagar, Kashmir
URL: https://newageislam.com/books-documents/muslims-india-other-indigenously-loyal/d/130195
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