Secular means not religious or not spiritual (material or lay). That is what the dictionary says. But in recent times the meaning has taken all sorts of twists and turns. Indian politicians tell you that they are religious but secular. This is like saying; the sky is blue but not blue.
Hardly any politician dares to say that he is not religious. That is because majority of the people in the country are religious and the politicians need to be part of the society for votes. Religiousness or spirituality is the ethos of India and not “secularism”. But the politician will go on insisting that India is a secular country because people belonging to many religions co-exist peacefully in this country. Does this mean that every individual, or every community should be unreligious to be able to live a life of harmony? If we remove the differences in religion, there could be difference in colour, language, educational levels, gender and so many more aspects that could divide people and create disharmony and strife for the society and the country.
Indians have been religious and will continue to be religious however much the yuppee secularists would like to have it differently. Religion was banished from communist countries but after some years it has resurfaced in those very countries. There can be any number of debates on the uselessness of religion, but man has need for spirituality to explore the depth of his inner being. Any degree of material success alone cannot buy him mental peace and spiritual solace.
The so-called secularism in the Indian context is a sham. It is the politician’s tool to win votes from minority communities. Politicians don on fancy headgears and ill-fitting clothes to identify themselves with different communities and groups and beg for votes.
For a Hindu politician it is important to visit a mosque or a church before the elections, so that he will not lose votes from those communities.
Though people belonging to different religious faiths are accepted in affluent countries, they will not be tolerated once they start challenging the local faith. The local’s faith today may be minimal or nonexistent due to other material diversions such as pursuit of success, sex or pot, but these pursuits will become increasingly unsatisfying and the individual will start searching for more permanent happiness. In his quest he will turn to religion. This is certainly happening in affluent countries at least in some degrees.
India’s ethos is religiousness or spirituality amid its diversity. But India’s constitution is secular. The constitution does not differentiate between people belonging to different communities. Every community has freedom to practice its religion. But this freedom to practice religion becomes irrelevant if all the communities do not have mutual respect for each other and their practices. It is important that, irrespective of the number of followers of the religions, they should all be considered equal.
It is well known that the British started the divisive politics in India. Apart from encouraging and aggravating the differences between the Hindus and Muslims, which led to the partition of India on independence, they sowed the seeds of dissention among the various caste groups of the Hindu community. The undeserving and self-serving so called leaders of different caste groups were encouraged to oppose the mainstream political struggle for independence.
Hindu society had a lot of ills. It is not a perfect society. With the passage of time The Hindu society has accepted changes and reforms. Though Hindu God-men may have influenced political leaders and politics marginally, their influence on mainstream politics is nonexistent. They do not call the shots. Their activities are confined to religious practice. In the western world, in olden days, the church had a strangle hold on political power. However that changed with time, and Secularism became the byword for progress. This is possible in the west with an overwhelming majority of the population of the same faith.
Hindu society has also changed a lot with time. Hardly any Hindu of present day has heard of Manu but the players of caste politics repeatedly talk of “Manuwad” to rubbish Hindu practices. Manuwad and the classification by “Varns” are all things of the past. Western education can take the credit for the reforms in Hindu society, but even with the reforms the Hindu religion has not weakened. If anything, the Hindu religion has only gained strength in recent times and there are many westerners who are quite impressed with the Hindu philosophy, the Vedas and the Upanishads etc.
In a country like India where people are essentially religious, Secularism is only a tool for administering Statecraft. It is not a tool, which the administration can use to divide people without impunity. In democratic India, only a shortsighted political outfit can use Secularism to divide people for vote bank politics.
In the present day Indian politics, the Shenanigans of Caste politics have a field day dividing the Hindu society. The Congress and the Communist Parties encourage this trend. Time will tell that the Congress Party, in all its wisdom has played a dirty game.
02/06/05 @ 14:22