The cock-a-doodle-doo moment

For the Indian middle class to impact politics, it must step out of the mould of the cockerel that believes its crowing makes the sun rise and truly embrace democracy, says T K Arun

INDIANpolitics is in ferment, and not just in terms of shoes and abuse that hurtle across the political landscape, high-tech electioneering that serves up Advani ads even on adult web sites and alliances amongst parties and leaders that render mere promiscuity almost as elegant, by contrast, as the sculptures of Khajuraho. There is an upsurge in middle-class activism in politics not seen after the Independence movement. This activism is welcome but almost certain to prove futile. Unless the middle class overhauls its own conduct to imbue it with the values of democracy, its exertions will have little real impact.
Authentic middle class heroes have entered the electoral fray as independents: Capt GR Gopinath who made it possible for the middle class to travel by air, Mallika Sarabhai who has long combined art with social activism and Meera Sanyal, banker and representative of the Mumbai elite shaken out of their complacency by the terrorist attack on the Taj and the Oberoi.
Venture capitalist Saurabh Srivastava has been trying to use networking to convert the middle class into a vote bank that would vote against criminals. Bimal Jalan’s Public Interest Foundation has embarked on a similar mission. Bangalore’s smartvote.com and Mumbai’s Mumbaivotes.com profile candidates and flag off those facing serious charges. Noida-based Kanan Jaswal has mobilised thousands of signatures online to petition the government to ratify the UN convention against corruption. There are numerous such other examples of middle class activism in the political arena.
This is all to the good, and far superior to supine passivity or indifference on the part a sizeable section of the population. Middle-class activism, historically speaking, has proved potent around the world in heralding political change for the better. For example, in the so-called ‘progressive era’ of American politics, which spanned 1890-1920, muck-raking journalists brought out political scandals and corruption, local government finances were opened to public scrutiny, a tax on income was instituted, anti-trust legislation famously led to the break-up of Standard Oil, public outrage over the foul profits made from Chicago’s unhygienic meat trade led on to creation of the Food and Drug Administration. After the second world war, the middle class in Europe led new social movements centred on the environment, women’s rights, disarmament and peace, which cumulatively enriched and deepened democracy.
In independent India, the middle class restricted its ambition to living the good life. You worked hard as a student, became a doctor, engineer, civil servant or bank officer, married within your caste and community, brought up your kids to become doctors, engineers, etc, and left politics to politicians. You made money on the side as your job allowed you to. You helped your kinsmen, expecting others to push theirs into jobs and positions of authority. Your biggest expectation from the budget, if you were a woman, was that the cooking gas subsidy should not be reduced. You did not bother if schoolteachers and doctors posted to rural areas never left town for their jobs but continued to draw their salaries — after all, they were people like you, how could they be expected to live in the boondocks? You reduced your members of Parliament to people who nurtured their constituencies, completely oblivious to their primary responsibility to voice your say in how the nation is run.
YOU paid bribes to jump the queue for some allocation or the other, to usurp someone else’s allocation. You paid the man who came to read the electricity meter to jam the meter. You took bribes. You employed child labour. You beat down wages, no matter whether these went below the minimum wage. You broke building rules and constructed an extra floor and encroached on public land. When your neighbour protested, you organised an all-night jagran, paid off the municipal inspector, the policeman and the local corporator.
You funded and voted for parties that preach hatred of people different from you. You condoned communal violence and violation of civil rights. You practised caste exclusion. You threw plastic into the river and on the hill slopes you visited. You littered the road and peed on the roadside. You broke every rule and law you could get away with breaking. You cheered Amitabh Bachchan’s angry young man and his flying fists as the way out of the mess you’ve created. And you cry blue murder when criminals and terrorists enter your life through the gaping holes you have broken open in your own edifice of civic existence.
Democracy is about political pluralism, civil liberties, human rights, group rights including minority rights, the due process of the law, distribution of political power across the citizenry and an institutional setup in which the judiciary, the legislature, the executive and the media keep one another in check and collectively pursue the overarching goal of expanding individual liberties while keeping the collective an enabling framework for individual creativity.
The right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness cannot be restricted to any strata in society: it must be universally accessible. There is no such thing as social harmony in an unjust society. Considering that India’s democratic project started off with highly unequal distribution of social and economic power, and therefore, of political power, democracy in India must provide for processes that level the field. These processes could be affirmative action, Bharat Nirman, and various strategies of inclusive growth. The middle class must accept this, and live out the imperatives flowing from it.
Economic reform in the sense of freeing up the creative potential of all citizens is an integral part of such democratic project — without structural diversification of the economy breaking the age-old correlation between caste and occupation, urbanisation and fast growth, empowerment of subaltern groups cannot be achieved. Without political agency, subaltern groups cannot realise their creative potential. The middle class must accept this relationship.
In the absence of such overhaul of middle-class sensibilities, their activism is likely to light up only the idiot box.

Forget the beard and burqa: Focus on essential teachings of Islam

While we may nonetheless ponder over the wisdom of Justice Katju’s reference to the Taliban, should we not simultaneously be asking some other questions too: Who is drilling into the heads of Muslim teenagers that their Islam is in deficit without a beard for the male and a head-to-toe burqa for the female? What is one to make of the ethical and intellectual integrity of the clean shaven retired judge, B.A. Khan, who appeared for Salim to argue that sporting a beard was an “indispensable part of Islam”? ... The next time you run into a Muslim obsessed about the burqa or the beard, ask what happened to the essential teachings of the Prophet: “To seek knowledge (in Islam all knowledge is sacred) is the religious duty of every Muslim man and woman”; “The ink of the scholar is holier than the blood of the martyr”; “To obtain knowledge travel to China if necessary”.

Muslims Are In India’s Mainstream

The Muslim identity of India is a thoroughly Indian identity, very different from the Islamic identity of other Muslim countries. This unique Indo-Islamic identity has evolved over centuries of intermingling of traditions, culture, religion and social contacts. The influence that practices of other religions had on the Islamic tradition, and vice-versa also led to the evolution of unique socio-religious traditions of the Muslims in India.



Indian Muslims draw their traditions from Arabs, Iranians, Turks, Afghans, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Abyssinians, and most of all from the traditions of the various regions of India. Indeed the Muslims of India, who are descendents of the original inhabitants of India for millennia, are as diverse as India itself.

By the 14th century when Turk kings ruled in the north, India had become a major center of Islamic learning. What Leonardo da Vinci represents to European renaissance, Amir Khusrou represents to Indian renaissance. In that period the major trend amongst the Muslims in India was to learn the philosophy, culture and tradition of India and to introduce the philosophy and culture of the Muslim world into India. Thus Khusrou was the pioneer in creating a new Indo-Islamic culture and tradition, and also a new language called Hindvi, the ancestor of today’s Hindi and Urdu.

Another major development in the Indo-Islamic ethos was in the area of architecture and technology. Ain-e-Akbari, the 16th century masterpiece gives ample evidence of Muslims’ having produced a variety of mechanical devices e.g. wagon mills, multi-barreled guns, screw cannons, and a variety of ingenuous machinery. Countless magnificent monuments and buildings all across India speak eloquently of the Muslims’ contribution to India’s distinct architecture. Muslims made major initiatives in the production of quality products like cosmetics, textiles, zari-work, metallurgy, glass and ceramics. Tipu Sultan is known to have developed rockets for use in his army against the expanding British campaign in India.

The development of irrigation, hydraulics and the construction of canals flourished as never before during the long Mogul reign. The harnessing of the principles of hydraulics and the use of devices such as deep wells, Persian wheel and artificial lakes, resulted in the development of the unique Mogul gardens. Large scale development of orchards and agricultural production was another enterprise of the Muslims.

Socially and culturally the greatest Muslim impact of the medieval era on India was through the Sufi movement which led to the growth of the Bhakti movement. The downfall of the Mogul empire after the first war of independence in 1857, saw Muslims of India go through a very traumatic period in which Muslims were subjected to much oppression by the new British rulers.

In the early decades of the 20th century growth of revolutionary and nationalistic literature occurred in the Muslim community. Slogans like “Inquilab Zindabad”, and songs like “Saaray jahan say acchha Hindostan hamaara”, and Allama Iqbal’s enthusiastic advocacy of the Indian nationalism are nuggets of India’s long freedom struggle whose origin lies in the Muslim community.

The partition of India in 1947 was a traumatic event for the Muslims of India, a majority of whom had taken active part in India’s freedom struggle under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi, and did not want the partition. After 1947 with guidance from Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Indian Muslims again started dedicating themselves to the building of the new nation, and to become active in various fields. After decades of struggling with this situation, Muslims are now well adjusted to the changed milieu of India.

Another important contribution of Muslims to the growth of the Indian culture is music and movies. Some of India’s top musicians of the 20th century, continuing on after 1947 are Muslims who contributed much to the substantial growth of genuine Hindustani vocal music, e.g. Khayal, Taraana, Dhrupad, Thumri, Qawwali, Ghazal, and musical instruments like Sitar, Sarod and Shehnai.

As the movie industry developed in India, Muslims took a leading role as actors/actresses, directors, producers, music-directors etc, putting Bollywood on the world stage of cinema.

In the last few decades India’s Muslims are again trying to re-invent the Aligarh Movement of the late 1800s and dedicate themselves to acquiring education. Although much remains to be done in this area, as the 21st century dawned, one could see the Muslim community in various parts of India, north, south, east, west, make a sincere effort to start educational institutions.

The recent emergence of APJ Abul Kalam, India’s top missile scientist; Azam Premji, a pioneer in the rapidly growing Information Technology industry; the internationally renowned painter MF Hussain; Sania Mirza the world class tennis player; many high achiever Muslims in Bollywood, as the as top leaders in their fields in India, is a testimony that Muslims in India are bouncing back to find their niche in the mains