Whether one is proud of the fact or ashamed of it, there is no gainsaying that religion has always been and continues to be the main line of demarcation and the main basis of discrimination in India. Minorities, therefore, connotes groups classified thereunder. They are: – (1) the Scheduled Castes and Tribes (in the Harijan dated 21-10-1939, Gandhi has admitted that the Scheduled Castes are a minority), (2) Muslims, (3) Christians and Anglo-Indian, (4) Sikhs and (5) Parsis. Together, the population of non-Hindu minorities in India is about 200 million or 20 crores. Thirteen years of life under Hindu domination has demonstrated that none of them is happy though all of them have not suffered in the same way and to the same extent. The main grievance, however, is that they do not have equality of status and opportunities with the major community. Even peaceful co-existence is denied to them. “Merge or vanish” is the silent demand; any resistance is suppressed with an iron hand beneath velvet gloves.
The nation has remained un- integrated because the biggest religious group in the country, having elected its own candidates to Parliament and Legislatures, regards itself a political majority, entitled to rule over the land. Having formed Governments, both at the centre and the states, it resorts, according to its age-long tradition, to discrimination on religious grounds and seeks to establish a convention that since Hindus are in a majority, non-Hindus should agree to be ruled over by them.
MINORITIES FEEL INSECURE
This usurpation by a communal group of the privileges of a political majority has given birth to a situation under which non-Hindu ipso facto becomes second class citizens.
A real and lasting solution to this problem can come only from the saner elements of the majority community itself.
But in the National Integration Committee appointed by the Congress there is none, besides the chairman, tall and bold enough to castigate the ruling community for its selfish narrow-mindedness and suggest checks and brakes to its & way-ward and unscrupulous behaviour. If the Congress high Command was optimistic enough to feel that members of the minority groups had the guts to speak out the bitter truth and present a solution, then it should have nominated real stalwarts, regardless of the party to which they belonged. The Congress has also blundered in regarding the problem of national integration as a mere party question. The committee, as constituted by the Congress, suggests that the High Command is just toying with the idea. How serious the problem is will be apparent from a study of its details.
Most human beings, classified under the term minorities, have been worried over the question of their security, they have rarely had the peace of mind or leisure to think of the other rights which the constitution has conferred on them.
Muslims were the first to disarmed and demoralised.
Murders, loot, arson and unlawful occupation of their lands and buildings was the order of the days during the first three years of the transfer of power. The programme is repeated at convenient intervals and places.
SIKHS BETRAYED
The next target was the Sikh community. On the eve of the transfer of power, they commanded great prestige and influence, especially as the Congress had preferred partition to the Cabinet Mission plan. It was this crucial turn in the history of India that the Sikhs, trusting the Hindus as their elder brothers, rejected the offer of Pakistan Muslims to accord to them an autonomous political status within the framework of Pakistan. This they did after Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru had publicly announced early in 1947 that he saw nothing wrong in conceding compact area in the East Punjab to the Sikhs where they might also experience the glow of freedom. Further, the Congress had given a solemn pledge that in framing a constitution for advantage would not be taken India, of the superior voting strength of the Hindus, but controversial matters affecting the minorities would be settled by negotiations and mutual agreements. All this was said before the transfer of power, it was quite a different story after the Aug. 15, 1947,
At the instance of the late Sardar Patel, a highly obnoxious secret circular was issued in Sept. 1947 by no less a person than Sir Chandulal Trivedi, Governor of East Punjab, asking his government to show to the Sikhs their proper place in a free India. Then followed wide-scale terrorism of the community and victimization of selected Sikh officials. Meanwhile, the constitution that emerged from the Constituent Assembly contained not one of the many assurances that were given to the Sikhs. When Nehru was reminded of the promises and confronted with actual performances, it appears that he just shrugged his shoulders and remarked that “circumstances had changed”.
The Govt.’s aim seems to be to make the Sikhs forget their previous importance. Nor is their concentration in one state relished by the authorities who would prefer to see them scattered all over India, each state dealing with the group within its administrative borders. Just-as the Muslim problem has been dissolved by decentralising it so also the High Command desires, that the Sikh problem should cease to be an all-India one.
DALITS PURCHASED
The Scheduled Castes are already regarded as having been bought over politically. They are, of course, considered too low to be absorbed and assimilated in the Hindu fold. Yet they dare not claim to be an entity by themselves.
The efforts of the late Dr. Ambedkar to recreate in them feelings of self-respect and dignity have been thoroughly washed away. The policy is to deprive them of their nuisance value and turn them into a docile and grateful herd. Whenever the High Command wants to punish any non-Hindu group in an informal way, the poor Harijans are put up to do the dirty job, so that, incidentally, every other minority should keep away from them and refuse to sympathise with them. It pays the majority community to create fissiparous tendencies even among Harijans. The latest design is to divide them on the basis of lower castes and castes not-so-low. Illiterate and emotional as they are, they fall easy prey to these tricks. Transfer of power has meant nothing more than mere change of masters of these original inhabitants of India.
Their main grievance is that they are not allowed to make any use of their population strength, that they are always made to feel that if they wish to make any progress, they can only do so with the help of the Hindus and never independent of them; that the pace of their educational and economic uplift is regulated by the majority community with an eye on perpetuating their subservience; and that tied to the apron-strings of the majority community, they are always led by the nose.
As things are they see no future for themselves.
Jagjivan Ram, who has sacrificed his popularity among his own people for the sake of the Congress, finds it difficult to be elected Deputy Leader of the party in spite of his seniority just because he happens to be a member of the Scheduled Castes.
NO OVERSEAS CONNECTIONS FOR CHRISTIANS
The Christian community has been tackled rather differently, because the presence of. foreign missionaries in India is a great deterrent to the use of naked force.
The technique adopted against them is to spread in a subtle manner misunderstanding and ill-feelings against foreign missionaries so that they may leave India in disgust.
The second item is to see that the different sects of the Christians do never get together, even for solving their common problems. Mutual suspicions and rivalries are cleverly fostered among them. They are expected to give up all cultural and spiritual affinities with countries other than India. Except for a few nominal safeguards, there is nothing to distinguish between Anglo-Indians and Indian Christians. The government treats both with equal indifference.
To give just one instance, the Madhya Pradesh Govt. obviously under the influence of organisation like the Jan Sangh, the Hindu Mahasabha, the Arya Samaj or the RSS has been persistantly refusing to extend official recognition and to give normal grants-in-aids to schools run by the Christians for the benefit of all. Even training facilities are denied to their teachers. Their representations and deputations are just ignored in defiance of Article 30 of the Indian Constitution.
PARSIS — A SECOND FIDDLE
Parsis would have been ignored as a minority, but they happen to be captains of industry, far-sighted economists and expert financers. As a first step, Government’s policy is to make sure that they play the second fiddle to Hindu capitalists and subordinate their own interests to those of the elder brother. It can be proved statistically that the Parsis are not half as prosperous as they were before 1947. The socialist process of levelling down is operating unceremoniously against them. Prohibition has nationalised their erstwhile monopoly in liquor trade. Time and taxation will push them lower down. It will be too late for the Parsis if they wake up then. They should face the displeasure of the ruling clique now and join the other minorities to save themselves from a worse fate.
MUSLIMS MINUS ISLAM
It was not difficult to exterminate the disarmed Muslims physically, because a fair percentage of the Hindus is inclined that way, besides, the major community holds the monopoly in the mechanics of propaganda and publicity. But the Hindu genius for suppression has evolved a technique which would finish the Muslims as a live force, and yet retain a bulk of their population to enable the rulers to flaunt their secularism about. This process has been set in motion simultaneously and in three different ways:-
(a) Young ones are deprived of the only link (Urdu language) between them and their sacred literature. Through specially prepared and textbooks, a high regard for Hindu culture and heroes in infused into their minds, so that ultimately, they may feel ashamed to call themselves Muslims.
(b) Admission of Muslim students however brilliant in professional or post-graduate colleges has been restricted to the minimum possible, their recruitment in defence, internal security, judicial, administrative and foreign services, as well as in the private sector is sternly discouraged.
(c) Economic strangulation and occasional terrorism has made even the former tall poppies among them forget all about their rights as self-respecting citizens. Now they only pray for security of life and property and freedom from hunger and humiliation.
DISGRACE TO HINDUISM
Muslims have suffered physically, economically, socially and educationally. They are now fast losing their religion as well as culture.
The commutative effect of all these deep-laid machinations has been that the bulk of the minority communities has had to lie low and keep aloof from the mainstream of national life. Broken down in spirit and feeling forlorn, they have no ambitions left except to pull on. They do not even have the satisfaction that their children will not face worse conditions of life. This is not to say that no member of the minority communities favoured or patronized by the majority. The essential condition for such individual patronage is that the person should just echo the majority voice; no discordant note is tolerated. Fundamental rights are there to adorn the constitution.
THE REAL DIFFICULTY
Far be it from me to insinuate that there are none among the Hindus, cultured, broad-minded and liberal enough to govern the country justly and efficiently on a human basis, without any discrimination on grounds of caste, creed or social status. They are too numerous to ‘be classified, but very few of them are in public life.
Unfortunately for the country barring honourable exceptions which can be counted on one’s fingers, democracy in India has thrown up persons who are a disgrace to the Hinduism we read about in learned treatises. Those in power are, generally speaking communally- minded, selfish, dishonest and unscrupulous. The real difficulty is that the temperament and outlook of a bulk of those in whose favour. power was transferred in 1947 is not secular, while the constitution assumes that it is. This basic anomaly is responsible for nearly half the population being discriminated against and denied its full rights of citizenship.
FIRST PRACTICE & THEN PREACH SECULARISM
The Jan Sangh, the Hindu Mahasabha, the Arya Samaj and the RSS not merely disown secularism but actually work against it. The Congress high Command, on the T other hand, insists that India should continue to be its own all the world over as a secular state. If the Congress organisation were also to practise secularism and educate the masses about its merits and virtues, the entire outlook of the country will change for the better within a few decades, at the end of which national integration will come about automatically.
INTERIM MEASURES
In the meantime, some immediate steps are very necessary to save the ‘minorities from the political suppression, economic distress, social ostracism and cultural extinction. The suggested steps should form the short-range policy of the Congress until its long-range policy of nationwide education in favour of secularism bears fruit.
(1) Enforcement of constitutional rights: It is necessary that the enjoyment of fundamental rights should be assured by declaring every act (of commission or omission) calculated to prevent full enjoyment as an offence punishable by law. Similarly, discrimination between citizens on the ground of caste, creed or social status should be treated as an offence. Arrangements should exist in all states for providing free legal aid to aggrieved citizens who wish to enforce their rights through a court of law.
FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS
The executive rides roughshod over the fundamental rights of the minorities in particular, because there is no social stigma attaching to this kind of behaviour; in fact, one who indulges in it fairly frequently is looked upon as a hero by the majority community and is talked about admiringly. Moreover, officials are aware that the aggrieved parties can ill-afford to go to court. Once they come to know that Governments are giving them facilities for enforcing their rights such infringements will be greatly reduced and the bonafides of the ruling party established beyond doubt.
(2) Preservation of culture: The minorities subcommittee of the Sapru Committee had laid down in 1945 that it shall be the duty of the state to impart education to the children of a minority of sufficient numerical strength, upto the stage of elementary education in their mother tongue and where this is not possible, the state shall give adequate aid to such institutions as cater to this need. This was based on the understanding that further education will be imparted in English.
But now that things are fast changing, it is necessary that education upto the university stage should be imparted in the mother tongue, English and the regional language being made compulsory second languages for those whose mother tongue and regional language are the same, the compulsory second language, besides English should be either Hindi or Urdu.
(3) Electoral reforms: That the quality and quantum of presentation of the minorities in the councils of the nation has been reduced to a farce is now openly admitted by all honest Congressmen. It is obvious that this is the direct result of joint electorate.
Instead of reverting to separate electorates straight away, it will be worthwhile to try via media which would give effective representation to the minorities and yet infuse in them a feeling of oneness with the rest of the nation.
REPRESENTATION TO MINORITIES
(a) Two methods suggest themselves: – One is that a convention should be established making it obligatory on every political party contesting the election to devise a method whereby the trusted members or organisations of each minority are invited to share the responsibility of selecting candidates on behalf of the party concerned. Secondly a successful candidate should have secured at least 50% of the votes of specified minorities in the concerned constituency.
(b) That the percentage of minority population in the country should reflect itself in the Parliament and state legislatures is one of the fundamentals of democracy.
To ensure this, the question of reserving seats for them should be considered afresh. The formula proposed by Mr. Abdul Majeed Khawaja, Bar-at-Law, was as follows: –
“All elections, whether to any legislature or Board, shall be on the basis of joint electorates, provided that the minorities shall have the minimum of their seats reserved according to their number and shall be entitled to contest other seats also.”
More than half a century ago, that far-sighted statesman, the late Mr. K.G. Gokhale, speaking in the Imperial Legislative Council on this very subject, had made the following suggestion: –
“I think the most reasonable plan is first to throw open a substantial number of seats to election on a territorial basis in which all qualified to vote should take part without distinction of race or creed. And then supplementary elections should be held for minorities which numerically or otherwise are important enough to need special representation, and these should be confined to members of minorities only”.
ANMERICAN FORM OF GOVT.
(c) The injustice done to the minorities in the delimitation of constituencies should be set right by restoring the status quo ante and by the institution of multiple membership with cumulative voting.
(4) Executive should be remodelled: The British type of executive provided in our constitution should be replaced by one intended to prevent the majority from forming a government without giving ‘an opportunity to the minorities to have say in the matter. Towards this end the American form of executive might be suitably adapted to Indian conditions. For instance, the Prime Minister and the representatives of the majority community in the cabinet should be elected by the whole House by single transferable vote while representatives of the minorities should be elected by each minority in the Legislature in a similar manner.
STONE IN PLACE OF BREAD
(5) Re-organisation of states: The policy of consolidating the North and balkanising the South on linguistic basis has adversely affected the already precarious condition of the minorities. The position will be improved to some extent if states like Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan and Maharashtra are further divided into convenient administrative units because as the area of the state increases, the proportion of the minority to the majority decreases and chances of the majority tyrannies over the minority become greater. The states must, therefore, be small if protection of minorities is aimed at.
(6) Protection of life and property: Of all minorities, it is the Muslims alone the protection of whose life, property and culture has proved a perpetual headache for Government since the dawn of independence. The task has become almost impossible as the forces of law and order are now constituted on communal lines and cannot, therefore, be depended upon to act impartially. There are but two ways in which the Indian Union can effectively discharge this responsibility: either the Muslims should be concentrated in two or three self-sufficient administrative units, or they should be given effective representation in defence, internal security, judicial and administrative services. The latter alternative would be more feasible.
The committee of national integration would do well to realise that the glaring contradictions between international policies have naturally made the minorities feel insecure, depressed and forsaken. As against the promised secular democracy, they must face the veiled dictatorship of an unchangeable communal majority, under whose protecting auspices the authors of Panchasheela and the staunch advocates of International peaceful coexistence quietly practise physical and cultural genocide in their own country.
WHY NOT NATIONALISE ADMINISTRATION
While the. Congress has nationalised, or intends to nationalise agriculture, industries, insurances, and even trade it is strange that it had never struck the High Command that more than any other undertaking, administration deserves to be nationalised in the first instance. National integration will come about only where administration is not treated as an exclusive preserve of the representatives or nominees of the majority community. Nationalising administration would mean giving to the minorities — not as a gift but as a matter of right — an adequate share In it.
