Is it not a fact that very often defenders of secularism are more conscious of the rights of Muslims than of the majority community?  This is specially true of Communists.

Gyanshankar, Mumbai

This is a question that has been raised ever since a secular, democratic Constitution was adopted in our country.  The Constitution was adopted at a time when a debate was raging about what the nature of the Indian republic should be.  Partition had just taken place and there were many who believed – and communal forces like the Hindu Mahasabha and RSS encouraged and propagated this belief – that since the Muslim League had raised the demand for Pakistan as a homeland for Muslims and because Pakistan had declared itself to be an Islamic State, India should likewise declare itself to be a Hindu nation and a ‘transfer’ of populations should take place.

This argument, being heard more and more frequently today, seems to be a very logical argument but actually it is a red herring that distracts from the real issue that was being discussed in all sections of our society and among the lawmakers which was what kind of a society is necessary for the strengthening of democracy, for real development of all sections of people and for guaranteeing their access not only to their human rights but to their rights of choice in education, profession and marriage and to all that is necessary for their health, happiness and well-being. The conclusion that they arrived at was that for real democracy and inclusive progress, secularism was essential.

While discussing the importance of secularism in the construction of a just and democratic society, we should also understand what forces are opposed to it and wish to replace it with. 

In 1950, when the secular, democratic Constitution of India was adopted, a Constitution that enshrined the principles of gender, social and religious equality also undertook to give special protection to the rights of not only the minorities but also of those who had faced social discrimination for centuries, the Scheduled Castes. 

It was Golwalkar, the leader of the RSS, who complained in the Organiser that “in our constitution there is no mention of the unique constitutional developments in ancient Bharat, Manu's laws... To this day laws as enunciated in the Manusmriti excite the admiration of the world and elicit spontaneous obedience and conformity. But to our constitutional pundits that means nothing."  This makes it clear that while the RSS claimed (and still claims) to oppose the Constitution because it gives special protection to the minorities in the name of secularism,  the Hindu nation that they want in place of the secular republic of India is one based on age-old and religiously sanctioned social and gender inequality. While they made and continue to make attacks on minority rights the cornerstone of their campaign, the nation that they want to establish is one in which the majority of Hindus themselves (shudras, dalits, women) are deprived of the rights that the secular Constitution of India tries to endow them with. They know only too well that if they talk about the real nature of the nation that they want to establish, it will be rejected out of hand. 

In our country today, the RSS and Hindutva forces have developed into the much stronger and better organised Sangh Parivar that consists of many organisations like its political wing, the Bharatiya Janata Party and its other wings like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Bajrang Dal, Durga Vahini etc.

Communists, on the other hand, have the greatest commitment and the greatest stake in defending secularism and strengthening and deepening unity among the widest sections of people on class lines and in defence of their class interests.  Not only do they have to do this continuously along with organising and waging struggles of different sections of the oppressed, but they have to fight against communal forces of all hues. They understand only too well that one kind of communalism reinforces and strengthens the other.

At the time of the Shah Bano controversy, the CPI(M) was the only party that took a principled stand inside and outside parliament and demanded that Muslim women should not be removed from the purview of the law on payment of maintenance to divorced women. It has always opposed minority communalism which seeks to deprive Muslim women of their rights.

The CPI(M) is well aware of the adverse impact that this tremendous strengthening of the communal forces has had on the unity of the exploited classes and their struggles. In this same period, the most vicious attacks have been made against the working class, peasantry and all sections of the poor in the name of furthering neo-liberal reforms.  That these attacks could not be fought back with ever-increasing militant unity is certainly due in large measure to the fact that the unity of the oppressed and exploited has been weakened and undermined by communal propaganda, most of it directed against the minorities.

The CPI(M) recognises and propagates that the growth of these forces is not a danger to the minorities alone but a grave danger also to dalits, tribals, the workers, peasants and women as well as all those opposed to authoritarianism and religious intolerance.  In order to ensure that these aspects of their policies remain hidden from large sections of the population, the Sangh Parivar uses a two-pronged strategy of increasing its vicious propaganda and violence against the minorities (which finds resonance among sections of the majority community) and in labeling any opposition to the totality of their policies and objectives as ‘anti-Hindu’.  Hence, we have to redouble our efforts, undertake effective and painstaking campaigns among the exploited and oppressed to expose the dangers that they face from the proponents of Hindu Rashtra and our interventions against all cases of atrocities and injustice against dalits, tribals, women and struggling working people.

Today, in a situation where the hard-earned and basic rights of the entire working-class are under attack, when unemployment and high prices have become unbearable, the fight against the Sangh Parivar and its objective of establishing a Hindu Rashtra has to be understood and joined by all those who are suffering under their policies.