The Bajrangisation of India

Was watching the program Hum Log on NDTV India yesterday (one of the few watchable programs left on TV these days). The topic of discussion happened to be the recent spate of violence against Christians in India. The debate was similar to the other numerous mundane debates that we keep having on TV these days, until something really unbelievable happened. The representative of the fundamental right wing organizations threatened the guest speaker, speaking on behalf of the minorities, that Indian Christians will be beaten up by their people if they don’t mend their ways. I was dumbstruck, it totally befuddled me. How can this happen? How can anyone have the audacity to come on national television on prime time and threaten the members of the minority community like this? At another point in the debate a young soldier recounted his horrific tale. This soldier who happens to belong to the minority Christian community and is a resident of Kandhamal(the site of violence in Orissa), has been threatened by the members of the right wing fundamentalists of dire consequences in case he dared to return to his home without changing his religion. Can you believe this, a soldier who has served the country gallantly in the Kargil war having to face prosecution and humiliation like this? And that too at the hands of a handful of religious bigots for whom nationalism is nothing more than shouting slogans of “Bharat Mata ki Jai” .I was filled with shame, shame on being a mute spectator to the effort s of a few to drag back my country into the medieval age. This incident brings my thoughts to a topic that has been simmering in my mind for quite some time now, the Bajrangisation of India.

We all talk about the Talibanisation of Afganisthan which began after the fall of the Soviets and we all know that the Talibanisation of Pakistan(especially of the north western parts) has also gained speed in the last few years. But to me, what is of more concern (since it deals with my own country), is the Bajrangisation of India. The only difference between Talibanisation and Bajrangisation is that only the religion on whose name the radical philosophies are propagated is different. The essential philosophy is the same, the philosophy of intolerance and violence. A philosophy which teaches that everything that does not belong to your own community is ominous and detrimental to your community. Civil societies across the world didn’t hate the Taliban because they tried to glorify their own religion they hated it because Taliban propagated hatred towards people of other faith. I mean, why on earth would the Taliban destroy the magnificent Bamiyan Buddhas? Reason,the statues were a symbol of the most tolerant of all religions on the planet, Buddhism and the Taliban has something radically different as its founding principle, the most vicious form of intolerance.

I believe something similar to Talibanisation(only religion is different in this case) is happening in India and its being perpetrated by the hooligans of the right wing fundamental organizations.The recent attacks on Christians in Orissa and Karnataka is a naked example of their goal of saffronising the whole of India. The Bajrang Dal, as is widely believed, is at the forefront of these attacks. And they even give a reason for their violent acts, they say that India is being converted to an overwhelming Christian nation by the use of western money. They claim that millions of poor and underprivileged in India are being lured to change their religion and hence to stop these dastardly activities they are free to attack the Christians in any way they like. Anybody with a little bit of rationalism left, will tell you that the allegations of the right wing fundamentalist outfits are utter nonsense. According to official census figures, the percentage of Christians in India has gone down from 2.8% in 1951 to 2.3% in 2001. Can the Bajrang Dal answer why is this the case if the Christian institutions have indeed been carrying out forced conversions for years? The number of Indians who are deprived, both because of caste and income depravity is so huge that luring them to change their religion with economic benefits would have been easy if a serious effort was made towards that end and so the number of Indian Christians should have radically gone up.

Let me make it clear, I don’t refute that there might have been cases of forced conversions in parts of the country by some Christian religious bigots but such littered incidents can never serve as a reason to carry an attack on an entire community. A community which has had as big a part to play in the development of the motherland as any other. Many of us have been fortunate enough to have study in the highly professional convent schools. Does anyone remember any of our teachers or the school administration trying to coerce any one of us into taking up their religion? I have never heard of anybody in my school trying to play up the might of one religion while downplaying any other. And am sure that’s the case with thousands of other Christian missionary institutions who have brought in that much needed element of professionalism to our education system.

Consider for a moment, that indeed the allegations leveled by the right wing fundamentalists is true, that indeed Christian missionaries have been involved in mass forced conversions across the country. Even in that scenario, may I ask, who has appointed the Bajrang Dal and other right wing fundamentalists as custodians of the Hindu faith? Who has appointed them as our liberators from the marauding Christian crusaders? Aren’t there laws in the country to deal with all un lawful activities including forced conversions and shouldn't the law breakers be punished by the law enforcing agencies instead of Bajrang Dal mobs? Its worthwhile to mention here that in all the states which have anti conversion laws like MP, Chattisgarh, Gujrat(all BJP ruled states) there has hardly been anyone who has been convicted of being involved in forced conversions.

The plain and simple reason for the attack against Christians is that the right wing fundamentalists needs a new target to channel their energies on ,after already alienating most of Muslim India. They preach the same things that the Taliban and its likes preach in other countries, that any religion other than your own is vile and vicious and detrimental to humanity. It’s trying to build a culture of intolerance among the majority community of the country and the time has come for the educated and rational members of our community to raise their voice against such hooligans among our own midst, for crime knows no religion neither does terror. Let’s be clear, shouting slogans of “Bharat Mata Ki Jai” before carrying out any inhuman activity does not make anyone any less of a terrorist than someone from the radical Islamist groups. There is talk of banning the Bajrang Dal and I don’t figure out how it is going to serve any purpose. As we have seen with the ban on SIMI, banning a fundamental organization is not a remedy in itself.. What SIMI did was simply to change its name and carry out its activities under some other name like the Indian Mujahedeen or god knows what. Similarly if the Bajrang Dal is banned, they will simply change their name and nothing concrete will come out of banning them. If civil society in India has to win the fight against radicals like SIMI and Bajrang Dal then the fight has to begin within, within our own communities thorough the instruments of introspection, dialogue and debate. I certainly believe that the reason for the overwhelming image of Islam as the most radical religion on earth has a lot to do with the educated and rational members of the Muslim community not raising their voice against radicals in their own fold. Fortunately, for the majority community in India the situation has not turned so bad as yet, we still have time to redress the damage but we must act and act now.

How do we do it? How can we fight the radicals and the fanatical mobs? My theory in this regard has always been simple, something I call the chain of rationalism. If every one of us manages to share our views and play out our thoughts forcefully to at least one of our friends, if that friend in turn does the same to one of his/her friends and if the chain continues like this, then before long we will have enough people in our midst for the Bajrang Dal or its likes to have any impact on our society and they will become irrelevant themselves. Thus, what a nationwide ban may not serve, we might be able to do it, if we dare to raise our voice against hooligans in our own midst. The people of Afghanistan and Pakistan couldn't stop the Talibaisation of their countries and we see how rapidly their stocks are falling in the eyes of the world, we in India, who dream of us as a 21st century super power rather than a bunch of medieval fanatics, simply can’t afford to lose this battle against the Bajrangisation of our own country.





Disclaimer:-

• This blog is purely personal and has no affiliation whatsoever to any individual or organizations I am/was/will be associated
• The views expressed herein are purely based on my opinions and needn’t be factual. In short, they are opinions, not facts and must be appreciated/dismissed as such