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By: Dr.Gautam Sen
June 19, 2006
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(Prof Gautam Sen has formerly taught political economy at the London
School of Economics for more than two decades.)
Hindus have suffered a succession of setbacks in recent years,
intensifying a retreat that dates back to the partition of India, indeed
earlier. The electoral fortunes of their putative defenders seem to make
little difference to their political circumstances. Their ethnic cleansing
from Jammu & Kashmir continues unabated and the plight of Hindus in
Bangladesh remains desperate, echoing the fate of Hindus earlier in
Pakistan. Islamic terrorists are routinely attacking their places of
worship within India itself. And elected political leaders have sought to
crush one of their supreme spiritual leaders, the Kanchi Acharya. India’s
religious minorities are also displaying a truculent assertiveness that
underlines Hindu powerlessness and hints at yet darker times ahead.
Yet, perhaps all is not lost and a measure of historical perspective is
required to assess what is likely to happen in the circumstances Hindus
encounter. Once Greek thought was virtually eradicated by the combined
onslaught of the Germanic invasions and the upsurge of Christianity (which
became seriously intolerant after 500 AD) it took almost another 500 years
for the European Renaissance to begin re-discovering Greek logic and
reason. The revival did not triumph wholly even after the Enlightenment
and the intolerant barbarian supremacists are still with us right now.
Islam had already joined Christianity in the race for world conquest and
domination. It reached an apogee under the Ottomans in the sixteenth
century, having swept aside much of the Christian Byzantine world earlier.
The Islamic lust for political power and Christian quest for world
domination remain an unfinished agenda and military conquest the principal
instrument for its attainment.
This same catastrophe could befall Hinduism because the beginnings of
their intellectual revival in the late 18thC have stalled since
independence – a coincidence? In an act of perversity, the RSS
self-consciously turned its face against intellectual endeavour when it
was founded. Guru-ji thought Hindus needed to organise themselves and
intellectual life a luxury that they could ill-afford. It is true that
Hindus were disorganised and a remedy was essential, but the actual choice
made was paradoxically stark since activism and thought are surely two
sides of the same coin. The consequences of that fateful choice are still
with us and the Hindu movement is simply not intellectually equipped to
deal with the complex situation Hindus face today. Ironically, the
movement was able to achieve political power by recourse to an issue
outstanding from the medieval period while the world around changed so
rapidly that they found themselves in quite unfamiliar territory. And too
many people in the movement remain ignorant about basic issues in the
wider world, wielding organisational clout to silence serious intellectual
criticism.
The imminent specific danger India faces is its de jure territorial
disintegration, accompanied by the casting to the winds of Hindu society
and what promises it may embed. This is already happening in significant
areas of the Indian subcontinent, including the Indian Union itself.
Hindus are also facing the most diabolical and sophisticated assault from
the Church, both Catholic and the various Protestant denominations. The
Church enjoys a huge presence in the global media and within India too as
well as possessing huge economic and organisational resources. The
Churches have cleverly insinuated themselves into the imperial ambitions
of their Western home states, reinforcing the political support they
receive from these states for their nefarious engagement with the weak and
the poor of the third world. The resulting danger of subversion is visible
in everything from the vicious campaign by Michael Witzel and his
colleagues against Hindus in California to the way the Dalit movement has
been seized and subverted by various Churches. The latter rightly perceive
the Dalits to be the most promising vehicles for forcing the retreat of
those who identify themselves as Hindus and demoralising them.
This is a highly effective campaign, which most Hindu activists simply do
not understand nor are they capable of comprehending in their current
state of self-confident arrogance and blissful ignorance. Instead of the
mostly tenuous cliches being peddled by Hindu activists everywhere one
needs to read the history of Christianity with care. I would recommend
Peter Brown’s, The Rise of Western Christendom, and Robert Bartlett’s, The
Making of Europe in particular, for a start, to understand the immense
longevity of their project for world domination. Islam remains their sole
global rival. Hindus merely constitute a sideshow despite their supposed
numerical strength, which is an oft-repeated empty fact that obfuscates by
creating a silly sense of reassurance.
Experience of most societies tells us that there is no point berating
Hindu politicians and their associates for behaving in a self-serving
manner. The standard textbook theory shows convincingly that politicians
in open, pluralist societies act like selfish egotists. They achieve power
by auctioning policies in exchange for cash and votes. There is a vast and
persuasive literature that outlines how the process works, from the role
that political institutions play in it to contrasting representational
outcomes between majoritarian (India) and proportional voting systems. The
latter empowers small political parties more than the former. There is no
reason to expect that pluralist politics will lead to a different
high-minded outcome in India.
Politicians in all societies display the behavioural pattern required for
their own survival. The espousal of conventional morality is only an
aspect of their public relations and ideological sound bites are a means
of communicating with their core supporters. These voters are the least
likely to abandon them because they regard other alternatives as even less
attractive. Thus, the actual policies implemented by political parties are
designed to please voters who might actually defect to a rival. Of course
there is a modest margin for truth and integrity in politics, but such
principles are mostly honoured in the breach and have been marginalsed in
India, more than in most other societies. Deceit and double-dealing are
the norm in politics everywhere though Hindus perhaps excel in it unduly.
This is why what is missing in India is a consensus on obvious national
interests, although that is not a non-issue even in large, mature
democratic societies like the US. But in India everything is up for grabs
and the lack of a national consensus has worsened in the past decade or so
of the supposed Hindu upsurge. It is so bad that the police in Bihar and
UP are alleged to have actually escorted bombers through their areas of
jurisdiction to their targets in Delhi. Also, note there are virtually no
successful prosecutions of terrorists (except that they get executed
rather than arrested in J&K, as it should be). The accused from the Mumbai
blasts remain unpunished and the notorious film star that helped them
remains a high profile public figure, adored by millions of Hindu fans!
The reason for this dismal situation is largely due to the fact that
national consciousness is weak in India. In most societies, historically,
such a consciousness was created by the state and ruling elites (see Linda
Colley’s, Britons for a revealing illustration).
In India anti-national forces, especially the Left and the Muslims and
increasingly the Church (as distinct from traditional Indian Christians
who are patriotic members of the Indian air force and navy in particular)
have made sure that any move to advance a national consciousness is
instantly labeled communal and anti-secular. Foreign governments,
especially the US, have had a major role in this successful attempt to
keep India divided in the past. The US government may now be changing its
priorities because of geopolitical reasons, but the Church is unlikely to
allow Indians to learn patriotism since that would contradict their
proselytising activities - whatever would happen to their potential
converts?
Apart from the routine deceit of politicians, large political systems
suffer from collective action problems owing to the difficulty of
aggregating opinions and articulating policy arising out of it. This is
primarily a technical issue, worsened in the Indian case by manifold
social, regional, ethnic and caste divisions, with all these faultlines
being assiduously cultivated by India's legion enemies. By contrast,
Muslims have reaped huge political dividends by overcoming this potential
collective action issue and managing to vote as a bloc. By controlling
anything up to 125+ Lok Sabha seats, where their votes determine who will
win, they can pretty much dictate to candidates. But Islam, historically,
has had a tradition of the mosque organizing political life and, in the
Indian case, the votes of their illiterate constituency. Can you imagine a
similar organizational nodal point for Hindus?
India’s mediocre leaders unfortunately chose a parliamentary system of
government in 1947 because they failed to look beyond their noses, i.e.
beyond Westminster in the UK. Large societies need presidential systems of
government to prevent small groups (read minorities in India) having a
veto over the political system. Since the President’s constituency is
national recalcitrant minorities of whatever shape, whether religious,
regional or indeed purely sectional would therefore find it more difficult
to veto policies held by society at large to be in their common and
therefore national interest.
There are variants of a presidential system to choose from and it would
have the great additional merit of forcing the issue of their identity on
Hindus and indeed propelling some sort of national awareness, even if that
doesn"t automatically mean patriotism. I fear this highly desirable
outcome is now beyond reach. Nor is it any longer possible to have the
kind of presidential authority parliamentary leaders with large majorities
can enjoy temporarily. Eventually, the forces of division assert
themselves because of the very imperious "presidential" behavior that the
temporary primacy of a parliamentary majority may allow the Prime Minister
in a parliamentary system. This is exactly what happened to the victorious
Indira Gandhi after 1971.
Is it possible that the BJP will announce that it would agree to fight the
next national general election on this constitutional issue alone and
guarantee that it would then immediately announce an election for an
Indian president? Perhaps they could even offer, as a gesture of goodwill,
to abstain from putting up a candidate of their own in order to encourage
others to support the idea of a Presidential system of government. Of
course such a change will require other complex constitutional
arrangements to be put in place, involving the distribution of powers
between a President and the legislature as well as India’s regions. There
are many such models of government internationally that could guide a
unique Indian solution. I believe this prospect would galvanise the
country and an electrifying election would occur, with many ordinary and
prominent people campaigning for such a constitutional transformation.
Let me finish with a small ray hope. While the forces seeking to cut India
down to size seem potent there are some countervailing factors. There is
growing Hindu anger and despair that can be organized though not by the
present discredited Hindu politicos, who are, alas, beyond redemption.
Urbanisation, which is proceeding apace in India, is connected to this
sense of Hindu outrage because it tends to replace an essentially
parochial consciousness with a more national perspective. Even so-called
‘backwards’ develop a more national sense of their being once they are
educated beyond high school; actually two years in higher education seems
to do it. This is why the disgraceful HRD minister wants reservations in
premier institutions, but is careful to ensure that little education takes
place at lower levels at all; nearly nil in much of UP state schools, for
example. Both the Muslims and uneducated Hindus need to be kept that way
for India’s current thieving politicians to survive and live like kings;
just look at life styles of OBC and Dalit leaders.
Finally, barring the presidential alternative, which would be a huge step
forward at an institutional level, a minimum of good governance can be a
vote winner. This seems unlikely to become a political platform because
virtually all politicians have their snouts in the trough, secular and
otherwise. But look at how the people of Goa and Punjab reacted to the
upright and efficient General Jacob, who, by the way, has been treated
poorly by the powers that be ever since, almost certainly because he
proved so popular.
When President's rule ended and elections were called in Goa, people took
to the streets with the slogan that they preferred to be ruled by Jacob
instead!! The good General used to stand outside government house at 8.30
am, looking at his watch and listing who was coming into work on time! By
the way, he is also India's greatest military hero since Shivaji, but the
Arab lobby made sure that he was not Bharat Ratna because he is Jewish. In
1972 a British military commentator described his victory in East Pakistan
as one of the six greatest military triumphs of the 20th century, truly a
period of gigantic wars.
Dr.Gautam Sen
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