Events & Issues

New Delhi, 9 July 2022

Diluting Democracy

HAMPERS HINDUTVA

By Dusmanta Kumar

BJP’s core theme of mobilisation has been Hindutva. Scholars and leaders seek to make a distinction between Hindutva and Hinduism; the former is treated as a political construct. Be that as it may. Hindutva and Hinduism are increasingly becoming synonymous for want of viable champions of Hinduism in opposition ranks. BJP has therefore managed to consolidate the Hindus. The concern in this piece is to examine how undermining democracy will hamper Hindutva mobilisation.

Let me make two formulations. One, Hinduism/Hindutva and democracy are co-terminus. I know that could be a provocative proposition. Yet, let us proceed with it as a working hypothesis. To use a caveat, in 1990s, I was participating in a democracy seminar in the University of Lancashire in the Lake District of United Kingdom. One of the presenters, a British professor called Indian democracy ‘an ethnic democracy’. Elaborating on it, he said, Indian democracy survives on account of diversity as well as pluralism in the Hindu religion itself which is a majority religion in India. This formulation has merits.

Hinduism is a polytheist religion, meaning there are various streams of spiritualism and practice. Believing in oneness of God and humanity, Hindus worship thousands of Gods and Goddesses which they consider the manifestations of the supreme God. In addition to differentiated Hindu spiritualism, the existence of caste which is considered a social sin, adds variety of identities in Hinduism which complement democracy. In conceptual terms, democracy means recognising and reconciling multiple identities.

Secondly, democracy involves sharing of positions, power and political space among various communities. That is how the tickets for candidates for Assembly and Parliamentary elections are decided on the basis of community support; the ministerial berths are allocated on same terms. In a representative democracy, not only the leaders represent people, they also represent various segments of population defined in terms of communities, which in turn are based on language, ethnicity, caste, religion, gender, profession and so on.

As the essence of Hinduism consists of pluralist beliefs and practices, it conduces democratic politics which promotes diversities and reconciles differences emerging out of them. The logical extension of this formulation is that Hinduism and democracy are symbiotic. If democracy is diluted, Hinduism is undermined, and vice versa.  In other words, it is to be underlined that the champions of Hindutva should respect and redeem democracy. This is not happening in hanker for power, and out of ignorance of the interface between Hinduism and democracy.

The second formulation is that legal and democratic are not one and the same. Political parties, mainly the present ruling regimes in the States and at the Centre seem to conflate the concepts of legal and democratic which leads to upending democracy. For the sake of conceptual clarity, take it that what is legal is not necessarily democratic. Legal relates to an outcome, a decision taken, but democratic refers to the process of arriving at such decisions. Debates, discussion, dialogues, inclusive participation of stakeholders, building consensus wherever possible, encouraging and respecting dissent are elements of a democratic process. Sadly, all these attributes are missing in our legislatures and even in public discourses across the country.

A law can be passed in the Parliament on the basis of majority. That is legal. But is it democratic? Was there adequate discussion in Parliament? Members of Parliament belonging to the Opposition parties complain that they are not given time to speak on bills that are made into laws. They are not even provided with the draft of the Bill in good time before it is tabled in the Parliament.

There are Parliamentary committees to scrutinise the Bills before they are put into motion. These committees are bypassed in making laws. Thus the roles of Parliamentary Committees ensuring accountability, value addition and an inclusive process, are undermined. The committees seek opinions from the public, professional bodies to examine various dimensions of a Bill. Thus, the stakeholders of various Bills are taken into a consultation process. This practice also helps in acceptance of laws by citizens.

Remember the three farm laws, which were passed without adequate consultation with the Opposition or the primary stakeholders, causing widespread and prolonged protest by the farmers until the laws were withdrawn. The infamous note ban is another example, which caused undue and avoidable distress to people without achieving the intended results – curbing black money etc.

Another example could be passing of CAA – Citizenship Amendment Act. The government may have its logic in excluding a particular community and including the minorities who are persecuted in their host countries. This was not adequately debated in the Parliament and explained to the public. Consequently, the country was plunged into unrest and strikes by students in the universities. This could have been avoided with due dialogue across the board.

Convening all party meetings is a practice that helps democracy. The government has the benefit of contrarian suggestions from different parties which help in better formulation of policies. These meetings have become rare across the federal layers of our country. The other medium for communication by government is the press, which can carry government’s intent and actions to the public. But strangely, the ministers do not address the press.

The ruling party has spokespersons, who, not being part of the government, could disseminate wrong messages. We noticed recently, one of their spokespersons, making indiscreet remarks about a religion which led to strong and hostile reactions in the country and abroad. The ruling party promptly disowned the spokesperson, disagreed with her remarks and dismissed her from the position. The point is, spokespersons could represent the party not the government. Sadly, the Prime Minister never addresses any press meet.

In recent times, an unhealthy trend of discussing religions in public is being noticed across States of the country. This is stemming from party-politicisation and radicalisation of religions. Both these practices do not augur well for our democracy. As said before, community mobilisation in electoral politics without causing inter-community antagonism is acceptable. In that sense, consolidation of Hindus may be in order. Many progressives will challenge this though. So be it. It is an existential reality for political parties in a competitive electoral politics.

If Muslim partiers can be registered by the Election Commission and allowed to function, why not Hindu parties!  But radicalisation of Hinduism, even in response to the same practice in other religions, negates the essence of Hinduism which consists of being tolerant, accommodative, reconciling and so on. To reiterate the point, radicalisation and religious monism of Hinduism goes against the practice of democracy as well as the spirit of the religion. Pluralism present in Hinduism fosters religious pluralism in India, which leads to political pluralism that constitutes the main pillar democracy.

To sum up, let us dig into the tenets of Hinduism. Only two will prove our premise here.  Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam – the world is just one family.  The other, “Sarve Bhavantu Sukhinah, Sarve Santu Niraamayaah, Sarve Bhadraanni Pashyantu, Maa Kashcid-Duhkha-Bhaag-Bhavet  (May all be happy, may all be free from illness, may all see what is auspicious, may no one suffer). If that is so, where is the scope for polarisation between communities, hounding, hate, vengeance and violence? ---INFA

(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)