It’s been a norm for those, who are now in power in India, to ask Muslims to go to Pakistan. This week, a BJP MP – Vinay Katiyar questioned the presence of Muslims in India by asking when the partition was done on the basis of religion, what are these Muslims doing here? And that they must go either to Pakistan or Bangladesh. What’s interesting is that far from being banished, such rhetoric has gained traction since last few years. People say they do it intently for political reasons. Well, that’s exactly the death-knell. If it were a lonely voice, we could have shrugged it off as a one-off incident. The worrying part is they get political dividends out of this. And what is a ‘political dividend’ here: More support from the people. This trickles down to the fact that Muslim phobia is on the rise in India, and such people are riding this tide quite smoothly.
Two points:
1.What baffles me, notwithstanding J&K (an international dispute as per us or at least a bilateral issue as per India’s favorite Simla Accord), Indian Muslims are loyal Indians. With the immense experience I have had with them in India, and especially abroad, they genuinely love their country. By and large, they hate Pakistan as much as their Hindu counterparts do. Most of them side with the Indian Army, despite the fact that they’ve helped Muslim graveyards mushroom in Kashmir. This is, in fact, our biggest complaint against them. I’ve seen post-Friday prayers protests against OIC for merely passing a resolution for Kashmiri self-determination. If there’s support for us from any quarter in India, it’s usually Hindu. We do not have any Muslim Arundhati or Navlakha in India. Even the most fearless Muslim leader- Assadudin Owaisi- asserts Indian claim on Kashmir. I’m aware some say that they are in minority, therefore not in a position to support us. True, but not really true. Almost all the Indian Muslims I have met, even abroad, who are not even citizens of India anymore, would oppose our cause tooth & nail, in private conversations within drawing rooms. This is because it’s their genuine belief. This may be because of their ignorance of the ground situation or blind nationalism, but this is what it is. The point here is not to gauge their support for our rights or debate about their positives and negatives, but to prove that they are no different from their fellow citizenry when it comes to their country’s stance. Many of these can even be seen running travel agencies to take devotees for Darshan to Hindu deities. Some of them even participate in Puja (idolatry- considered to be one of the fundamental prohibitions in Islam). If there is any Muslim community which identifies itself less with the idea of Muslim Ummah and the issues surrounding it, it’s them. With minuscule exceptions of cracker sounds from Muslims areas on Pakistani victory, they get as hurt by it as other Indians do, when it comes to cricket. My contention is on what basis they are perceived to be somewhat ‘lesser Indians’ or traitors who need to be sent to Pakistan. They have rejected it and have embraced India. It’s just because of their proclamation of being Muslims, which is sore in the eye of the Hindutva brigade. If this is the reaction for just the title, imagine if some of them were to oppose country’s stance where it’s due.
2.The Sanghis must understand that such an attitude of dreaming about Muslim-Mukt Bharat would mean another partition since neither can 170 million be annihilated nor converted to Hinduism. And the much-hyped advice ‘Go to Pakistan’ is not practical either, since that itself is a nation of 193 million and their Muslims are almost the same number (170 m). I’m not interested in carving out a new homeland for the Indian Muslims, but to academically see the roadmap, if the wish of these RSS workers were really to be implemented, they need to answer a question. Apart from Muslim-majority J&K (anyway disputed), are they willing to cede roughly about 40% of their Punjab along with 10% of Himachal, 30% of Rajasthan, 40% of Gujarat, and 15% of West Bengal, to realize the dream of ‘Muslim-Mukt Bharat’? Not a bad deal for them, at all! The ‘Akhand Bharat’ seems to have lost appeal since they now openly advise Muslim Indian citizens to embrace Pakistan. It’d be better to end this hypocrisy if phobia of these innocuous Muslims has really seeped into Hindu psyche, so deep. However, if they love their country and do not want to see it divided, then they need to accept the Muslims as equal citizens. That wouldn’t just help the Muslims but it would help India to flourish. Partitions & mass-migrations are gory. Take your country towards prosperity, not to yet another partition.