In this previous post of mine, I had spoken about the discrimination that people from other religions and castes continue to face in our society. In this context, it was very heartening to hear Omar Abdullah’s speech during the UPA’s confidence motion debate.

His speech began with the following words:

“I am a Muslim and I am an Indian,” he began. “And I see no distinction between the two. I don’t know why should I fear the nuclear deal. It is a deal between two countries which, I hope, will become two equals in the future,” said Abdullah. “The enemies of Indian Muslims are not America or deals like these. The enemies are the same as the enemies of all those who are poor — poverty, hunger, lack of development and the absence of a voice.”

While the BJP, the Left and other parties in that huddle continued to say that the nuclear deal was anti-Muslim, here was an opposition leader trying to bring some unity back in the thoughts of people. It is clear that politicians play the divide and rule game very often and this is becoming more and more disgusting as time progresses. I am glad that we have younger and more thoughtful leaders like Omar Abdullah in the Parliament, a place which currently houses at least 50 criminals.

Excerpts from his interview with The Indian Express:

“There has been a concerted effort to create this perception that first the Muslims are against the nuclear deal with America and also that the nuclear deal with America is anti-Muslim. This is all rubbish and this perception is being created by those political parties who always want to brand Muslims to be against the interests of the country,” he said. “That’s why I did emphasise that I am a Muslim and I am an Indian and that the two are not mutually exclusive”.

Read the interview and excerpts of his speech here.

Last week, I watched a documentary titled The Indian Miracle which was aired some time back in the Dispatches TV Series. Dispatches is a series of television documentaries running on Britain’s Channel 4 and predominantly deals with Britain’s society and some amount of international affairs.

Getting back to the series that I watched online, The Indian Miracle. This documentary started off showcasing the sudden surge in the Indian economy and how India was poised to become the next economic superpower. The rest of the documentary focused on two main issues as I saw it:
1. Discrimination based on religion
2. Discrimination based on caste

I was more distubred by the first case, in which they interviewed a Muslim man and asked him whether he faced discrimination in this country. Without any hesitation his answer was yes. This came across as a little disturbing fact to me and of course it is shameful on us as a country.

“Why do you say so?”, asked the narrator cum interviewer.
The man replied that he was a commerce graduate and yet was unable to find a job. And this was not in the hinterlands of India. This was a man standing in the city of Mumbai. Armed with a degree in India’s financial capital, he was unable to find a job solely because he was a Muslim. Was this true?

I spoke to one of my Muslim colleagues, who is a very close friend of mine, and he was immediate in his answer – “No, never ever faced any discrimination of any sort”. He further explained that people who don’t work hard enough to make opportunities for themselves, end up playing the religion based discrimination card.

However, I had another Muslim colleague in my previous company, who was a wonderful cricket player and a very good friend of mine. We used to accompany each other in the long bus journeys back home from office. He had recently moved to Bangalore and had joined my office. After about 3 weeks or so, he told me that he was unable to find a flat or a house anywhere. I offered him the names of some real estate consultants but eventually nothing worked out.

Reason?
“Everytime I go and check out the place and everything seems fine. We also agree on the price. Then the time comes to make the agreement deed and when they know my full name, the owners go back on the offer. They just plain refuse to rent out the house to a Muslim.”

My friend had a neutral first name (which means that it could pass off as a Hindu or a Muslim name) and had a last name which conveyed his religion.

That was the first time I got a rude shock of how this attitude is prevalent even in the so called urban areas of the country. Why do people fail to realize that at the end of the day, everyone is just that – people? Why is religion such a big deal when it is meant to provide you a comforting hand?

Also, read this blog post by annie of Known Turf. I too watched the movie Aamir over the weekend gone by and it was very disturbing. The fact that such a deep divide exists amidst people’s minds poses a grave danger to us as a country.

What do we do? Where do we go from here? Will the divide get bridged? Or are these futile questions?

Two interesting decisions and rulings – both religion based.

TN to have religion-based quotas

The Tamil Nadu government has announced exclusive reservations for
Christians and Muslims in government services and educational institutions.
Chief Minister M Karunanidhi told the state Assembly that the government
accepted the recommendations of the state Backward Classes Commission, headed by Justice M Janardanam, a retired judge of the Madras High court.

Muslims in UP can’t be treated as minority: HC

The Allahabad High Court on Thursday ruled that Muslims will not be treated
as a religious minority in the state any more.

“Muslims have ceased to be religious minority in Uttar Pradesh on considerations of materials on record includes various census reports including report of 1951 & 2001,” the court stated.

What is interesting to note is that both these decisions have big political impact in the respective states, for obvious reasons.

In UP, the Assembly polls are just around the corner and this verdict will dampen the spirit of the current ruling party. Although it is a High Court verdict, the common man would remove his ire on the government.

In case of TN, the DMK had included in its manifesto for the 2006 Assembly elections that it would provide exclusive reservation for Muslims and Christians. By issuing this decision, it has lived up to its manifesto and has hit bulls-eye in the field of religion-based politics.

My personal take is that reservations are needed, including caste-based, religion-based and economic status based. Reservations are, no doubt, a patchwork remedy to the decades of bad governance and are fuelled by the multi-party system in this country. However, this same multi-party system helps keep sanity in our government structure and provides for a larger structure of democratic rule. Where we clearly lack is in the implementation of all these reservation policies. The judiciary can play a role only in directing rules or policies related to reservations. The legislature has to take up the problem of implementation of these policies more seriously. More sessions should be devoted to the fair execution of reservation rules rather on devising more policies or modifying existing

Firstly, where we lack is a comprehensive database listing the demographics of this country in detail. We do have the census, which is touted as the largest government service carried out in any part of the world, but the census hardly does little more than provide aggregate figures of the socio-map of India. What it needs to do is build individual profiles and have them categorised based on various factors such as religion, caste, financial parameters, physical access to education/medical care and so on.
Based on this information, any decent data analysis shall easily be able to reveal the worthy potential receivers of reservation-based aid. Over a period of time, we could have a greater percentage of reservation quotas being filled in a fair manner and once this is done, sometime in the near future, it could help in bringing all people on the same plane.

Until then, we shall continue to see political parties play in this lucrative playground and create havoc with the lives who still wait for the much-talked about help. We shall also continue to have coffee-table debates on the worthiness of reservations.