The barrage of Hindutva propaganda and the Congress’s present leaders’ political immaturity has rendered us incapable of objectively evaluating many accusations against them. One of such accusations was that the Congress appeased Muslims presumably for political gains. In fact, I too had this opinion, though I qualified that they had appeased other communities too wherever it suited them in the past. But analyzing the so-called Muslim appeasement with the existing political situations of that age and evaluating some of the words of its own ministers in the past made me wonder whether that’s indeed such a straightforward case or not.
When the Congress had appeased Sikhs or Christians, it was very state specific where Hindus were a minority. On the contrary, there was an example in Kerala, where the Congress could rely on Christian and Muslim votes, the party appeasing the majority community (which traditionally voted for the Communists overwhelmingly) in the case of Sabari Mala temple entry for women. These examples don’t exactly qualify as ‘minority appeasement’ but that tells one important factor that as a national party the leaders saw themselves as Hindus. This factor again comes into picture when Arif Mohammad Khan made a statement that Hindu Congress leaders felt they would be seen as communal if they went against the Muslim laws and supported the Supreme Court verdict on Shah Bano. We need to bear that in mind when we analyze whether any acts seen as Muslim appeasement were intended for political gains or not.
The first accusation is related to Uniform Civil Code. While Congress leaders enthusiastically reformed Hindu personal laws and set the stage for emancipation of Hindu women, they did nothing in the case of Muslims. Did they do it for political gains?
The reformation in Hindu laws was implemented immediately after independence. Even with zero percent Muslim vote there would have been no stopping of the Congress winning the parliamentary elections for the next two or three decades. So any suggestion that it didn’t reform because it thought the loss of Muslim vote meant loss of power sounds preposterous if we consider the existing situation.
Another greatest blunder or copy book Muslim appeasement appears to be in the case of Shah Bano. According to Subhashini Ali of the CPI(M), the Congress which had overwhelming majority in the parliament scared of losing power because of VP Singh’s rebellion and the Muslim protests triggered by the Shah Bano verdict. On top of it, Rajiv Gandhi’s senior figures told him they would lose the elections if they lose the Muslim votes. Since a communist has made those allegations it does sound correct about the Congress. If we dig further, however, one could observe that the supreme court verdict was overturned by passing an Act in 1986 but VP Singh’s crusade against the corrupt industrialists peaked in the late 1986 and he was shunted (or promoted) to defense ministry in 1987. So the argument that the VP Singh’s rebellion responsible for this Act appears bit shaky. Also, Arif Mohammad Khan, a strong proponent of Muslim reform and who was initially supported by Rajiv Gandhi to give a favourable speech in support of the Supreme Court verdict and left the party along with VP Singh to form their own party, didn’t consider VP Singh as one of the causes. He directly blames Hindu leaders of the Congress(along with some opportunistic Muslim members) who wanted nothing to do with the Muslim laws. Between Arif Mohammad Khan and Subhashini Ali, I would think the former would have had better idea of the situation being an insider.
Arif Mohammad Khan’s account gives consistency to the Congress policy since the independence. It’s a Hindu party and had no business interfering with the Muslims’ personal lives. Of course this is true only in the decades when it didn’t have to count on Muslim votes to win the elections. But now its quest for Muslim votes is hampered by the Hindutva narrative of Muslim appeasement harking back to an era when it was irrelevant for them to get the Muslim votes to win elections.
Nevertheless, its reluctance to interfere with the Muslim personal laws even without the consideration of Muslim votes doesn’t of course make that correct. What was the logic behind this thought process anyway? I remember reading a senior Congress figure(whose name unfortunately I have forgotten but who migrated to India from the present day Pakistan during the partition) that the Congress always expected the reformation to come within the Muslim community itself as had happened with Hindus historically (though he probably meant after the British rule). Again he probably identified himself as a reformed Hindu overcoming the bitterness of the partition.
In hindsight, that kind of thought process of all these Hindu leaders of the Congress has proved to be flawed. If we observe pure Muslim countries of the Arab lands, the reformation was forced by dictatorial or military power with varying degrees of success. In fact, even in India it was the reformed Hindu class that made these reforms possible as the average male Hindu was typically under-educated and backward thinking around that time. With no political power to make their own rules or the military might to force it, for the Muslim reformed class in India, this would have always been a non-starter.
References:
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/...
https://scroll.in/article/730642/ar...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_M...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V._P....
When the Congress had appeased Sikhs or Christians, it was very state specific where Hindus were a minority. On the contrary, there was an example in Kerala, where the Congress could rely on Christian and Muslim votes, the party appeasing the majority community (which traditionally voted for the Communists overwhelmingly) in the case of Sabari Mala temple entry for women. These examples don’t exactly qualify as ‘minority appeasement’ but that tells one important factor that as a national party the leaders saw themselves as Hindus. This factor again comes into picture when Arif Mohammad Khan made a statement that Hindu Congress leaders felt they would be seen as communal if they went against the Muslim laws and supported the Supreme Court verdict on Shah Bano. We need to bear that in mind when we analyze whether any acts seen as Muslim appeasement were intended for political gains or not.
The first accusation is related to Uniform Civil Code. While Congress leaders enthusiastically reformed Hindu personal laws and set the stage for emancipation of Hindu women, they did nothing in the case of Muslims. Did they do it for political gains?
The reformation in Hindu laws was implemented immediately after independence. Even with zero percent Muslim vote there would have been no stopping of the Congress winning the parliamentary elections for the next two or three decades. So any suggestion that it didn’t reform because it thought the loss of Muslim vote meant loss of power sounds preposterous if we consider the existing situation.
Another greatest blunder or copy book Muslim appeasement appears to be in the case of Shah Bano. According to Subhashini Ali of the CPI(M), the Congress which had overwhelming majority in the parliament scared of losing power because of VP Singh’s rebellion and the Muslim protests triggered by the Shah Bano verdict. On top of it, Rajiv Gandhi’s senior figures told him they would lose the elections if they lose the Muslim votes. Since a communist has made those allegations it does sound correct about the Congress. If we dig further, however, one could observe that the supreme court verdict was overturned by passing an Act in 1986 but VP Singh’s crusade against the corrupt industrialists peaked in the late 1986 and he was shunted (or promoted) to defense ministry in 1987. So the argument that the VP Singh’s rebellion responsible for this Act appears bit shaky. Also, Arif Mohammad Khan, a strong proponent of Muslim reform and who was initially supported by Rajiv Gandhi to give a favourable speech in support of the Supreme Court verdict and left the party along with VP Singh to form their own party, didn’t consider VP Singh as one of the causes. He directly blames Hindu leaders of the Congress(along with some opportunistic Muslim members) who wanted nothing to do with the Muslim laws. Between Arif Mohammad Khan and Subhashini Ali, I would think the former would have had better idea of the situation being an insider.
Arif Mohammad Khan’s account gives consistency to the Congress policy since the independence. It’s a Hindu party and had no business interfering with the Muslims’ personal lives. Of course this is true only in the decades when it didn’t have to count on Muslim votes to win the elections. But now its quest for Muslim votes is hampered by the Hindutva narrative of Muslim appeasement harking back to an era when it was irrelevant for them to get the Muslim votes to win elections.
Nevertheless, its reluctance to interfere with the Muslim personal laws even without the consideration of Muslim votes doesn’t of course make that correct. What was the logic behind this thought process anyway? I remember reading a senior Congress figure(whose name unfortunately I have forgotten but who migrated to India from the present day Pakistan during the partition) that the Congress always expected the reformation to come within the Muslim community itself as had happened with Hindus historically (though he probably meant after the British rule). Again he probably identified himself as a reformed Hindu overcoming the bitterness of the partition.
In hindsight, that kind of thought process of all these Hindu leaders of the Congress has proved to be flawed. If we observe pure Muslim countries of the Arab lands, the reformation was forced by dictatorial or military power with varying degrees of success. In fact, even in India it was the reformed Hindu class that made these reforms possible as the average male Hindu was typically under-educated and backward thinking around that time. With no political power to make their own rules or the military might to force it, for the Muslim reformed class in India, this would have always been a non-starter.
References:
http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/...
https://scroll.in/article/730642/ar...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_M...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V._P....
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