EDITORIAL

National Integration: Unity In Diversity, Not Uniformity

AFTER a gap of nearly thirteen years, the National Integration Council (NIC) met on August 31, 2005.  The reconstituted NIC discussed the basic theme of “communal harmony through governmental action, education and media”. 

The NIC last met in November 1992. At this meeting which was boycotted by the BJP at the height of their inflammatory Ayodhya movement, a unanimous resolution moved by Harkishan Singh Surjeet was adopted.  The resolution authorised the then government of P V Narasimha Rao to take all necessary measures to ensure the protection of the Babri Masjid.  History, however, is witness to the fact  that this did not happen.  The demolition of the Babri Masjid on December 6 and the gory consequences of mayhem and killing that followed unleashed communal polarisation of the worst kind (i.e., until the State-sponsored communal genocide in Gujarat).

Since then, the NIC never met.  During the six years of the BJP-led NDA rule, despite various pleas, the Vajpayee government refused to convene the NIC. This was only natural given the RSS/BJP’s understanding that India is a country of “one nation, one people, one culture”. The RSS/BJP simply does not recognise, ideologically, the multiple  diversity that constitutes and  defines India today. 

Ironically, despite having refused to convene the NIC during their tenure, both Vajpayee and Advani  shared the dais alongwith the prime minister, the UPA chairperson, other former prime ministers and the general secretaries of the CPI(M) and the CPI.  The CPI(M)’s submission to the NIC, circulated at the meeting, is  reproduced elsewhere in this issue. 

The presence of both Vajpayee and Advani did not, in any way, signify that they have deviated from their ideological positions that are wedded to the concept of the RSS version of a “Hindu Rashtra”.  This, as we have repeatedly pointed out in these columns, is totally antithetical to the secular democratic republican character  of modern India. 

While Vajpayee spoke in terms of changing the name of NIC in Hindi from ekta parishad to ekatmata parishad, Advani spoke in terms of panth nirpekshata (equality of all sects) instead of dharma nirpekshata (equality of all religions).  Both these are central to the RSS’s ideological moorings. 

While there may be little to dispute in terms of semantics on what Vajpayee sought, the RSS reasoning behind this is assimilation of all religious diversity in India into the fold of Hinduism.  In other words, they simply do not recognise India’s rich religious diversity.  Further, given the fact that Hinduism as they define is practiced by a larger number of people than any other religion in India, therefore, we are told that all those embracing other religious denominations must exist in the country only by accepting Hinduism and its leadership.  Golwalkar stated this in chilling terms as early as in 1939.  Those passages have been repeatedly quoted in these columns in the past. 

Likewise, Advani’s distinction explicitly suggests that the only dharma is 0Hinduism while all other religions do not qualify to this status and hence are only panths or sects.  Once again, the superiority of Hindu religion and the inferiority of all other religions is openly suggested. This refusal to accept the equality of rights of all religions in India is the genesis for fomenting communal hatred and polarisation. 

Both these positions fundamentally contradict the provisions of our Republican Constitution.  Any promotion of national unity and integration in our country, far from not being achieved by such conceptions, will only be further removed.  Hence, in the interests of India and its unity and integrity, such conceptions must be rejected. 

Such a rejection also implies that secularism in the Indian context cannot be seen merely as the equality of all religions. It must be the separation of religion from State and politics.  While the State shall protect the right of every individual to pursue and propagate his/her religion, the State itself shall not profess any religion.

While the NIC must discuss, in its future meetings, all dimensions that affect national unity and integrity (such as caste inequalities, economic inequalities, regional disparities, linguistic discrimination etc) and suggest remedial actions for the government of the day to undertake, it will do great service to the modern Indian Republic if it can ensure the popularisation and implementation of this scientific concept of secularism.