An Open Letter to all fellow Secularists opposing the Beef Ban in Maharashtra

Dear fellow secularists,

Like all of you, I firmly believe that religious identity should not have anything to do with the affairs of the state (there should also be no religion-derived laws), or even public life, except freedom to hold religious congregations and celebrate religious festivals. As Indians, we needn’t look beyond our western neighbour to know what the adverse consequences of mixing religion and politics can be in the contemporary era (as for dealing with the issue historically, in our own country, social evils like ‘sati’ and untouchability existed for centuries with state non-intervention, if not state support, owing to the rightly or wrongly interpreted religious sanction associated with them). Many talk of the Zia era to explain the messy state of affairs in Pakistan, but the fact is that after Jinnah’s demise, the Objectives Resolution moved by Pakistan’s constituent assembly clearly enunciated the establishment of an Islamic state, and Zia’s ‘secular’ predecessor Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was the one who introduced the law stifling the religious freedoms and civil liberties of the Ahmedias for vote-bank politics, ignoring the sagacious advice that Pakistani judge Justice Munir had given them, asking the Pakistani state to not define who is a Muslim and who is not. While Bhutto was drawing on the legacy of the constitution of his country, in terms of infusing religion in politics, perhaps, by way of his anti-Ahmedia legislation, he set in motion the historical process that made Pakistan go down the slippery slope that led to the rise of the TTP, a terror outfit that certifies whether or not it is Islamic for girls to go to school, and even physically attacks a Malala when she dares to defy them.

Pastor Martin’s following quote about the Nazis is famous in that regard:

“First they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew. Then they came for the Communists and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist. Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.”

Likewise, in Pakistan, Muslim extremists initially only targeted Pakistani Hindus, Christians, Jews and those they regarded as following deviant sects of Islam, but now, the average Pakistani Sunni going to a mosque or market too faces the threat of being bombed! Similarly, the elements in India that wish to promote undemocratic ideas like the prohibition of apostasy from Hinduism, prohibition of inter-religious marriages (for them, every instance of a marriage between a Muslim man and a Hindu woman amounts to “love jihad”, glossing over how very many Muslim women have married Hindu men and changed their religion and name, prominent examples being sitarist Roshanara Khan, model Nayyara Mirza and actress Nakhat Khan, who on getting married, changed their names to Annapurna Devi, Nalini Patel and Khushboo Sundar respectively), seek to impose their version of history on us, and often have an aversion to the English language and other cultures, should be kept in check.

However, having said that, it is equally important to note that the state machinery in a nation-state is a product of the nation and its historical journey, as eminent jurist Savigny had emphasized. Every nation is under a compulsion to define its own identity, and for European nation-states, that identity is rooted usually in language, say English for England, French for France, Spanish for Spain, German for Germany and so on.

However, in a linguistically plural country like India, what is the common thread from Gujarat to Arunachal Pradesh and from Kashmir to Kerala that gives us our identity? If we were to historically trace India, it was never close to being a single political unit in its current form, except under the British, though we did come close to that in the Mauryan and Mughal periods. Indeed, if there is anything fundamentally shared across the length and breadth of India, it is Hinduism, or Vedic culture (that manifests itself even in the Durga Puja being observed by sections of ethnic locals of Meghalaya and the dance Hojagiri performed by sections of ethnic locals of Tripura), and speaking of our linguistic diversity, even the common thread of influence, even if not origin, is Sanskrit, even for Urdu, a combination of Persian and Hindi, for Hindi is derived from Sanskrit. I know that some fellow secularists reading this would jump at the idea of defining Indian cultural nationalism based on Vedic culture, which they would hold as not being inclusive of the religious minorities and responsible for caste discrimination and patriarchy, and their critiques of the Hindu scriptures may or may not be valid depending on the context and every such matter is debatable, as is with texts of other religions. I am not personally averse to such debates (I am myself critical of several mainstream Hindu beliefs, like a wife meant to be devoted to her husband, and practices, like karva chauth, and I also don’t literally believe in scriptures per se), usually involving Marxist deconstruction of ancient Hindu texts, and I’ve co-authored an article hailing Mani Ratnam’s movie Raavan for attempting at doing so, and we should welcome all voices in a democratic setup, and I, for one, am not suggesting ‘culture’ as a clearly defined entity to be frozen in a static mould, but rather, an evolutionary entity open to internal and external dialectics, as also layering of external influences that can enrich the same, which is why I believe in a composite conception of Indian culture, of which Vedic culture is a base, not a puritan narrative of culture that is antagonistic to other influences (even the Rigveda clearly mentions that we should welcome noble thoughts from all directions, and in this, I may add that we should welcome and appreciate creativity in the realm of the natural sciences, social sciences or fine arts from across the globe, rather than attempt to suggest that creativity in ancient times was an Indian monopoly, writing off the contributions of other civilizations, as I discuss in this article). Furthermore, I may point out that as per my understanding and that of many others, what we know as Hinduism is open to such dialectics, even in the context of the most fundamental theological debates like the existence of God, as the beautiful Nasadia hymn from the Rigveda demonstrates.

Within the umbrella of Hinduism, we had Rishi Charvak propagating atheism, and he is showcased with utmost reverence in the Mahabharat. The Ramayan also makes a reference to an atheist sage visited by Ram in the forest.

On the issue of caste too, there is much that is contentious vis-à-vis the actual position of the Hindu scriptures. The Chandogya Upanishad, for instance, narrates the story of the butcher Raikva who was acknowledged as a great and wise man by a virtuous king, who seeks knowledge from him, and the Rigveda demonstrates that caste doesn’t have to be hereditary or hierarchical. Even the often-cited Purusha Sukta of the Rigveda talking of castes emerging from different body parts of the creator can be interpreted in a completely different fashion, given that God, as per the Vedas and Upanishads, like, for example, the Quran, is formless, and in that context, He has been ascribed names based on His attributes, like ‘Brahma’ for being the creator (the Quran uses the term Al Khaliq for God in the same context, and even the Quran does metaphorically refer to God as having eyes, hands etc.), and so, the creator manifesting itself in the creation of the human society meant that different occupations served as all being integral to the society as body parts, not about any being superior or inferior, and the Purusha Sukta also refers to Earth, worshipped as a mother-goddess, as having emerged from the feet of the creator! Also, the very same Rigveda also carries a verse talking of how a certain person follows a different occupation from both his parents, which shows that caste was initially neither meant to be hereditary nor hierarchical.

Buddhism and Jainism too emanated from Hinduism (borrowing words like ‘Om’, the custom of touching feet, and going by many analysts, drawing themselves from Vedanta), and while it is true that there were some Hindu rulers like Pushyamitra Shunga, Mihirakula and Shashank of Gauda who were intolerant to Buddhists, going by several Buddhist accounts, it is equally true that there were rulers like the Guptas and Satavahanas who patronized Buddhist monasteries and learning centres.

Even staunch secularists like Shashi Tharoor (much before Modi became PM or the Sunanda Pushkar episode took place) have held Hinduism to be the common cultural strand across India and even the basis of the sustenance of India’s secular and democratic character for its inherent openness (even to atheism and agnosticism), and Amartya Sen has also talked of that openness in his book The Argumentative Indian.

Later, with the advent of Islam in India, there were several Muslims who identified with India’s indigenous culture, like Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya, Amir Khusro, Akbar and Dara Shikoh. This is not to say, however, that to be considered an Indian, one should be under any compulsion to identify with or appreciate Vedic culture, just as one needn’t identify with or love the French language to enjoy full citizenship rights in France, and mere territorial affinity and pleasant memoroies of having been born and brought up somewhere can suffice to make someone a patriotic citizen of his/her country. That said, for many others, nationalism also inevitably relies on cultural symbols and motifs, for as American writer Alex Haley puts it – “In all of us there is a hunger, marrow-deep, to know our heritage – to know who we are and where we have come from. Without this enriching knowledge, there is a hollow yearning. No matter what our attainments in life, there is still a vacuum, emptiness, and the most disquieting loneliness.” In the context of India, many of those symbols and motifs that define India do have a Hindu background, like the language Sanskrit (which has a grammar believed to be best suited for computer programming internationally, as also much acclaimed non-religious literature like the Panchatantra that became the basis of Aesop’s fables, Chanakya’s Arthashastra that gave the canons of taxation much before Adam Smith, and the works of Kalidas, and even ancient scientific texts that were utilized by eminent Indian-American mathematician Manjul Bhargava to prove a mathematical law, and Bhargava has won the Field Medal, the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in the field of mathematics), the Ramayan, the Mahabharat (both of which, even if seen from a non-religious point of view, are fantastic pieces of literature showcasing every human emotion and that too in poetic form, and if taken as fiction, then displaying great imagination), Holi, Diwali, the temples in Mahabalipuram, Puri and Konark, and the Kumbh Mela, which are marks of Indian-ness (even if an Indian doesn’t identify with them in a religious sense), not only for many Indians but foreigners too. Yes, one should, in my opinion, highlight these symbols in as inclusive a fashion as possible, such as to mention how Dara Shikoh wrote a commentary on the Upanishads and showing how it is, in so very ways, similar to the Quran interpreted in an esoteric fashion, or how Ghalib’s poetry was influenced by Hindu and Buddhist ideas or how Ghalib told Marx to study Vedanta in the correspondence he had with him, or how Amir Khusro likened India’s ancient wisdom to that of ancient Greek thinkers like Aristotle, or how there are very many Sanskrit scholars from the Muslim community even today, but the mere invocation of Hindu cultural symbols in the context of our national identity should not automatically render someone to be called communal, the way Jinnah called Gandhi that, because Gandhi was a nationalist leader who was also a practising Hindu, a fact he didn’t conceal in his public life, and at the same time, such was Gandhi’s commitment to communal harmony that he fell to the bullet of a Hindu extremist.

Equally, even those facets associated with Muslim culture in India, like Urdu or Mughal architecture shouldn’t be seen in parochial terms and are as much marks of national identity for all Indians. There were and are eminent Hindus writing in Urdu like Gopichand Narang. Mughal emperors like Jehangir and Shah Jahan had Hindu mothers. The one who manned Shivaji’s artillery was a Muslim, and Ibrahim Khan Gardi fought for the Maratha camp against Ahmad Shah Abdali. Muslim nobles like Daulat Khan Lodi fought alongside Rana Sanga against Babar. Rajputs like Man Singh and Jai Singh fought for the Mughals against Rana Pratap and Shivaji respectively. India has even produced remarkable personalities like Kabir, who can’t be exclusively claimed by Hindus or Muslims. Also, Muslims shouldn’t be typically remembered in a negative sense only as foreign invaders, if we don’t remember the Shakas, Kushans and Bactrian Greeks in the same vein, and Indian rulers like Samudragupta and Rajendra Chola also invaded foreign lands, for territorial conquest was the norm then.

Coming back to the European countries we referred to where we said that nationalism is language-based, even within their strongly entrenched democratic frameworks, they have their own political parties that emphasize the role of Christianity, and many of them do, even if nominally, have a state religion (like the Protestant denomination ‘Church of England’ for England). Take, for instance, David Cameron’s opening statement in an article written by him:

“LAST week I held my fourth annual Easter reception in Downing Street. Not for the first time, my comments about my faith and the importance of Christianity in our country were widely reported.

Some people feel that in this ever more secular age we shouldn’t talk about these things. I completely disagree. I believe we should be more confident about our status as a Christian country, more ambitious about expanding the role of faith-based organisations, and, frankly, more evangelical about a faith that compels us to get out there and make a difference to people’s lives.”

Now, writer Sakrant Sanu makes an interesting observation (his reference to the press is to the international press):

“(L)et us imagine that Prime Minister Modi made the statement:

‘I believe we should be more confident about our status as a Hindu rashtra, more ambitious about expanding the role of Hindu organisations, and, frankly, more evangelical about spreading Hinduism to make a difference to people’s lives.’

All hell would break loose in India if Modi were to say this. However, this is just a restatement of Prime Minister Cameron’s statement about Christianity and Britain. But for some reason, Prime Minister Modi apparently has to be tagged as a ‘Hindu nationalist’ in every press report while Cameron is not tagged as a ‘Christian nationalist’.”

[I do, however, understand that Modi has a record of a horrendous anti-Muslim carnage that occurred in Gujarat in 2002 when he was chief minister, in which he is believed by many to be complicit (and no, contrary to what many of his fans have been shouting from their rooftops, he hasn’t been acquitted by the Supreme Court, leave alone been tried by it yet), which Cameron does not, but when a BJP politician from Goa called India a Hindu nation, the BJP immediately came under attack from all leading English language media houses, including Times Now, in spite of a Christian politician from the Goa unit of the BJP agreeing with that contention and even identifying himself as Hindu in terms of cultural values, and while I welcome the criticism by the Indian media too, I am just pointing to how religion is not so controversially believed to shape national identities according to not-so-fringe elements in even those countries where one may not normally imagine it to be the case.]

Equally, however much we may be, and in my opinion, should be, against the idea of the state having a defined religious character, a democracy does have room for those who believe in religious ideals as a way of moulding statecraft in a democratic fashion, especially if it sees religion not as an exclusive badge of birth-based identity but an ideological framework, just as parties calling themselves Marxist or ‘samajwadi’ see Marxism or ‘samajwad’ (though even parties representing specific sections of the society are allowed to exist in India, such as the DMK, MNS or MIM, though I think that seeking to represent specific groupings is in itself problematic, for isn’t an MNS candidate meant to represent the non-Marathis in his constituency too?). Interestingly, again, in Europe, there are several political parties with ‘Christian’ in their names and are part of an international conglomeration called the Christian Democratic International, such as the Christian Democratic Union led by Angela Merkel, currently in power in Germany. As BJP-critic Saubhik Chakrabarti has stated:

“Christian Democrats evolved as sensible, socially liberal political actors in much of continental Europe. No one accuses them of religious extremism or theocratic fantasies.”

What is important, however, is that any ideology, when extrapolated in a democratic framework, has to stay within the confines of democracy, wherein personal liberty (of which religious freedom is only a component) has to be respected (Switzerland, for all its claims of direct democracy, has been majoritarian rather than democratic, denying its women the right to vote till the early 1990s, and banning mosque minarets). Thus, while a party can be guided by any religious ideals, it should not legally impose supposed religious tenets that interfere with personal liberty, and while the likes of England are, on the whole, only nominal theocracies, countries like Pakistan have tried a heavy mix of theocracy and democracy, which has proved disastrous, as has been discussed right at the outset of this article.

Now, coming to the issue of prohibiting cow slaughter and eating beef in Maharashtra under the current BJP dispensation in that state. It is a violation of personal liberty and something I strongly condemn, and I welcome others condemning it too. Having said that, the question is whether it is logical to specifically highlight this issue now as a grave onslaught on India’s secular and democratic character.

We, the votaries of secularism under a democratic setup (unlike say, the Maoists rejecting electoral democracy), often cite the usage of the term ‘secular’ in the Indian constitution, and the fundamental rights of religious freedom and the minorities’ cultural and educational rights, guaranteed in Articles 25 to 30 and personal liberty under Article 21 of the constitution. We assert that secularism is something that lies at the very core of the translation of the “idea of India” in our legal setup in the form of our constitution, which forms the bedrock of all our institutions of governance, and is therefore, sacrosanct. The constitution is a living document amenable to amendments (except to its “basic structure” including secularism), but what is in discussion here is the spirit of the constitution. Thus, we are not seeking to modify the theoretical basis of our government functioning, but to merely strengthen it in practice and prevent it from being corroded, unlike those advocating secularism in places like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia (like activist Raif al Badawi in Saudi Arabia facing lashes for his advocacy of secularism), wherein such people desire a change in the basis of the setup altogether. In this regard, what the Indian constitution has to say on this point of cow slaughter also becomes relevant.

The Indian National Congress had, since 1906, fought for India’s freedom from British rule and had sought to represent Indians, cutting across religious lines. It was composed of people of very diverse schools of thought, and did have within its fold even some who had religious right-wing leanings, but the organization, on the whole, remained strongly secular, and the fact that it had several Muslim presidents from time to time, the most remarkable of them being Maulana Azad, testifies this.

The constitution of India was written at a time when India was yet to recover fully from the bloody scars of the partition at the behest of the Muslim League, and while Jinnah may not have had a theocratic outlook, history will hold him responsible for the horrific Direct Action Day riots in 1946 (but he is still the beloved Qaid-e-Azam across the border).

Our constituent assembly was composed of Indians of perhaps all possible shades of political opinion, and other than members of the Congress, included even members of religious right-wing parties, like the Hindu Mahasabha and the Indian Union Muslim League (the Muslim League members who chose to stay back were and are allowed to run their party, though the Congress ceased to exist in Pakistan, though it had a considerable following there before the partition, and Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and his followers were undemocratically denied a political existence – Pakistan’s downfall, thus, began much before the emergence of Zia).

The constitution emerged as a secular document, though not explicitly using the word ‘secular’ (which was inserted later in 1976), but it was clear from there being no mention of any state religion and the fundamental rights guaranteed to the citizens, especially under the provisions mentioned above. However, there were certain dimensions of the constitution that served as an exception to the principle of religion having no role to play in the affairs of the state (other than the standard holidays for religious festivals that exist globally), such as allowing Sikhs to carry ‘kirpans’ as a part of their religious freedom (not permissible to everyone else otherwise) under Article 25, the provision for allowing the continuation of different personal laws for Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Parsis and Jews (though asking for the introduction of a uniform civil code in due course under Article 44), and last but not the least, a directive to state governments to prohibit the slaughter of cows and other milch cattle under Article 48 (though this last provision even supposedly had non-religious, economic dimensions too, though those can, of course, be debated).

On the issue of cow slaughter, there was indeed a very heated debate. Nehru, for one, was an agnostic and ate beef, and he did not fold his hands in any place of worship (there are fake quotations attributed to him and conspiracy theories about him floated by Hindu rightists to portray him as being a Muslim, but that’s irrelevant), and equally, he was a lover of the Indian civilization (the passage in his will about how he identified with the Ganga in a non-religious sense makes for beautiful poetic prose), though not its uncritical admirer and a forward-looking man. For him, such an imposition was undemocratic and he was opposed to the very idea of such a ban, though the Hindu Mahasabha was unsurprisingly all for it, and there were some Congressmen in the constituent assembly pushing for the ban too. Our own personal beliefs aside, it has to be understood that constitution-drafting is not an easy task with a wide variety of people, including those with political opinions repugnant to ours and where compromises have to be struck to accommodate everyone’s views somewhat for the sake of representation, even if dishearteningly and reluctantly, and the bloody partition at the behest of the Muslim League may have psychologically ended up strengthening the Hindu rightist lobby to some extent, though they couldn’t, on the whole, have their way when it came to the constitution. Ambedkar, as the chairman of the drafting committee of the constituent assembly, blatantly refused to make a countrywide cow slaughter ban compulsory in the Fundamental Rights chapter as an exception to personal liberty, and the compromise arrived at was to introduce it as a Directive Principle of State Policy, by virtue of which state governments could introduce such a ban at their own discretion, and you can read about the same here.

As an advocate of personal liberty, I am even averse to Hindus being prohibited from eating beef, and it is not for the state to compel people to follow what may be religious tenets, and there should be peace, even if others eat what you don’t eat for religious reasons! However, the ban on cow slaughter has a constitutional basis we cannot really question, though we are free to criticize the ban and even express our angst against, though not question, its constitutional basis.

Interestingly, an Indian Union Muslim League delegate in the constituent assembly stated – “it is better to come forward and incorporate a clause in fundamental rights that cow slaughter is henceforth prohibited, rather than it being left vague in the directive principles, leaving it open to provincial governments to adopt it one way or the other.” This doesn’t come as very surprising to me, for Mahatma Gandhi had campaigned against cow slaughter (though not asking for it as a legislation), and he mentions in his autobiography that in the 1920s, when he offered support to their cause of protecting the Muslim caliphate headquartered in Turkey (a blunder in the opinion of many analysts for it amounted to appeasing regressive tendencies of supporting an undemocratic, colonial Turkish regime, and encouraging extra-territorial affinities), those Muslim leaders unconditionally offered to join him in his campaign against cow slaughter, though he himself was averse to the idea of clubbing the two issues. I remember that some years back, on the social media, a deeply devout Muslim who was strongly averse to the Hindu right, suggested that Indian Muslims can forego cow slaughter, following the injunction of working for peace and goodwill in verse 2:224 of the Quran. More recently, in the context of the beef ban in Maharashtra, the Muslim Chamber of Commerce and Industry in India has welcomed the ban saying it would boost milk production, and this is not to say that such Muslims represent the community at large.

It may be interesting to point out that after independence, when a certain right-leaning Congressman proposed to move a resolution (not law) against cow slaughter in parliament, Nehru so much as offered to resign, saying – “I would rather resign than accept this nonsensical demand.” The resolution was never tabled.

Subsequently, however, several states such as Madhya Pradesh and even J&K introduced prohibitions on cow slaughter, before Modi became prime minister, which were upheld by the judiciary for their constitutional basis, and the ban on the sale and consumption of beef in several states was controversially also accepted within this ambit. While this may be repugnant to what we believe in, it is worth noting that it is the judiciary that upheld that if a sect of Christians, in the practice of their faith, chose to not sing the national anthem but still stood up, they had the freedom to do so (an argument that would obviously apply to Vande Mataram for Muslims and Christians not wanting to sing it, for they have not objected to patriotic songs or patriotic slogans in general, but they believe that they can respect, but not worship, anyone other than God, be it the motherland or their own parents). It is the judiciary, thanks to which many innocent civilians – Muslims, Adivasis and others – falsely framed as terrorists, have been exonerated. It is the judiciary which has convicted hundreds of rioters in connection with the anti-Muslim riots in Gujarat in 2002 (in cases relating to massacres such as in the Best Bakery, Ode, Sardarpura and Naroda Patiya), hundreds in connection with the anti-Sikh riots in 1984 (though some prominent politicians in connection with the anti-Sikh riots in 1984 are yet to be convicted) and the anti-Christian riots in the Kandhamal district of Odisha in 2008 (in which MLAs like Manoj Pradhan were convicted), as also many terrorists killing innocent civilians in the name of religion, and recently, it upheld the right of the Greenpeace activist to travel abroad and even struck down Section 66A of the Information Technology Act as unconstitutional. So, we cannot simply write off the judiciary if and when it comes up with something we disagree with, and while the beef bans may be controversial, the judiciary can’t be faulted for upholding the cow slaughter bans for their sheer constitutional basis in the most literal sense, and if a law is within the four walls of the constitution, even the ‘slippery slope’ argument of other freedoms being curbed is not exactly valid, so long as the constitution retains its basic structure.

However, there has been a tendency recently on the part of some of us to selectively cite only the ban in Maharashtra as a major threat to secularism and democracy (is it because this happened after Modi became prime minister, and if so, however much one may personally despise Modi, isn’t that a very biased way of looking at things?), as though that were the first such ban, and the brouhaha created about it has gone to the extent of Scroll, an online portal carrying an article on lions in Maharashtra parks not getting proper nutrition with cow slaughter banned, though that portal has never otherwise carried pieces on the nutrition of wild animals (even India Today carried a piece on this), not even in the context of earlier cow slaughter bans in other states!

On the other hand, as secularists, there are other issues we can agitate for in conformity with our constitution,  such as putting an end to religion-based personal laws, and in this, I include not only the personal laws of the religious minorities but even of the Hindu majority, for all these personal laws discriminate against women to varying degrees. I know that this issue is believed to have been hijacked by the Hindu right as a metaphorical stick to beat the religious minorities with, but as progressives, it is only desirable that we stand for the rights of women in the minority religious groupings too, especially when such demands have come from within their communities also, and when there are people from the minority communities supporting a uniform civil code too. Even Bollywood actor Saif Ali Khan, in his article slamming the idea of ‘love jihad’, has also said that we need a uniform civil code to be a truly secular state, which would indeed be the fulfillment of a constitutional obligation. It may be noted that largely, across the West, there is a uniform civil code, and even in India, when we can have uniformity in criminal law, tort law, contract law etc. (though religious law codes have dealt with these subjects too but are rightfully not applicable), why not a uniform family law that would be in conformity with a modern conception of human rights that we hold to be sacrosanct? Nehru pushed for reforms in Hindu personal law against much opposition from regressive Hindus (he desired to reform other personal laws too, but passed away before that), and as progressives, there is no reason for us to allow regressive and somewhat theocratic-minded people of the minority communities to come in our way, and Hindu personal law, in spite of several reforms, isn’t still completely fair to women across the country.

If beef bans are violative of the principle of religion not relating to the affairs of the state, which they are, then so is the sustenance of these personal laws, and while the personal laws are respectively applicable only to their respective communities while these beef bans are universal within a state (and it is worth noting that the BJP government in Goa, for instance, has unambiguously stated that it would not ban cow slaughter or beef, owing to the support the BJP has there from a sizable section of Christians, and so, Indian politics is often much more complex than it is portrayed), women not having equal rights in matters like inheritance and divorce is a matter of far greater concern than someone not getting their plate of beef, especially when, in any case, by and large, beef is usually not commonly available in India! This is not to say that I am being insensitive to beef-lovers, but this is, in any case, more or less a lost cause, given its constitutional basis, and on the other hand, there are more important issues to focus on (please note that I am not engaging in whataboutism to delegitimize criticism of the beef ban, but my contention is that we should fight for causes worth fighting for, rather than lost causes), not only within the ambit of secularism but even otherwise as citizens of a developing country, such as the efficacy of the Right to Education Act (also introduced in fulfillment of a constitutional obligation), fixing our health care systems and so on, but other than some glaring incident (like the recent one of parents climbing the walls to help their children cheat in a Board exam in Bihar) coming to light, we seldom focus our attention on issues of reforming our physical and social infrastructure, or focusing on the reforms needed in our policies to make them more efficient (how many drawing room discussions do we have about the reasonableness of recognition norms for low budget private schools educating many of our poor, or how to ensure hygienic midday meals in government schools, for example?).

Our selectively going ballistic only about a beef ban seems more like an elitist drive for beef-lovers getting to eat what they like, that doesn’t concern the common man of this country  (yes, there are very valid concerns with respect to those whose livelihood has been adversely affected by the ban, but going by that yardstick, all bans adversely affect livelihoods, be it the recent liquor ban by a Congress-led government in Kerala, or bans on products that endanger wildlife, and livelihoods can’t be a yardstick to question constitutionally authorized bans – agitating for giving employment benefits to those adversely affected by the ban can be a good idea, or better still, those genuinely concerned about those who lost out financially on account of the beef ban, can help those people get jobs under state or central schemes, and given that most people in the cow slaughter business are Muslims, especially those schemes specifically aimed at the religious minorities, like Nayi Manzil launched by this Modi government – yes, even this government has rightly or wrongly launched schemes specifically for the minorities) and only alienates many religious Hindus, when we are often rightly seen as shying away from issues concerning displaced Kashmiri Hindus (this piece rebuts the conspiracy theories and other rationalizations given for their exodus; none of their killers has been convicted in 25 years, unlike hundreds rightly being convicted in the Gujarat riots cases, and speaking of religious freedom, many of us were silent on the denial of access to Kashmiri Hindus to the Kosur Nag lake for a pilgrimage), Muslim personal law, the Haj subsidy and the likes. Our silence on right-wing Christian evangelists from the West engaging in conversions of Hindus in India employing not-so-ethical means (also exposed by Tehelka, not in the least a Hindu rightist magazine), but opposition to ghar wapsi as regressive (even when there is no evidence of it being coercive in most cases, though possibly financially incentivized, as you can read about here and here) smacks of hypocrisy that strengthens the Hindu rightists, for we tend to be seen by many an average Hindu (basically not deeply communal, and having good inter-personal relations with some people of other religions, and possibly going for pilgrimages to durgahs) as an elitist fringe that is only against Hindu rightists, but doesn’t stand for the legitimate interests of Hindus or challenging reactionary elements among the minority religious groupings if and when the need arises, and even sees us as those acting as apologists for minority extremism and minority appeasement (we didn’t go ballistic criticizing the decision of the Akhilesh Yadav government to release all Muslims charged in terrorism cases, fortunately disallowed by the judiciary, as we have gone over the beef ban in Maharashtra), making him/her see the Hindu right as not-so-untouchable, even though he/she doesn’t particularly share their worldview.

Yes, it does help to sometimes give a message to the very loud, extreme Hindu rightists that we don’t fear them and can assert our stand in a democracy without being intimidated by them, as the distribution of beef by lawyers in Chennai in protest against the ban in Maharashtra demonstrated, but our real objective should be to ultimately change the mindset of the religious rightists. There is much that we need to do to ideologically fight the right-wingers of all religious labels, like reaching out to people to logically deconstruct and dispel prejudices (as I have humbly attempted to do in this book in the context of anti-Muslim prejudices among Hindus and in this article in the context of anti-Jewish prejudices among Muslims) that lead to a communal attitude that translates itself into hate speeches or riots, but I dare say that systematic attempts like these are seldom to be seen, and we, more often than not, are seen as people loudly shouting condemnations of communal hate speeches and violence from our rooftops. That, by itself, usually does not work to bring those people to our side who have an apathetic attitude or a stance contrary to ours on such issues. Many of us, secularists, did not wish to see Narendra Modi as prime minister, but we failed, and we do need an honest rethink on our stances on a number of issues. This is just my take on the issue of beef bans, and similarly, my take on what our approach to Pakistan should be, as secular Indians, is mentioned in this piece.

Regards,

Karmanye Thadani

About the Author

Karmanye Thadani is a freelance writer based in New Delhi. A lawyer by qualification, he has authored/co-authored four short books, namely ‘Anti-Muslim Prejudices in the Indian Context: Addressing and Dispelling Them’, ‘Women and Sport in India and the World: Examining the History and Suggesting Policy Reforms’, ‘Onslaughts on Free Speech in India by Means of Unwarranted Film Bans’ and ‘The Right to Self-Determination of Pakistan’s Baloch: Can Balochistan Go the Kosovo Way?’. He has been involved in making an Urdu television serial on Maulana Azad, which has been condensed into a film ‘Aashiq-e-Vatan Maulana Azad’.