Caught between two extremisms

Wahhabi influence and Hindu nationalism are responsible for the radicalisation of a small segment of Muslim youth

News reports about occasional acts of terrorism outside of Jammu and Kashmir, which for historical reasons forms a special case, attributed to young Indian Muslims have appeared intermittently in the press. In addition, several recent reports suggest that global jihadi organisations such as the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) have recruited a few Indian Muslim youth primarily by exploiting the latter’s local grievances to serve their own global goals.

Many analysts, Indian and foreign, had assumed until recently that Indian Muslims were immune to extremist propaganda because of both the syncretic and moderate nature of Indian Islam and the democratic and secular character of the country which made them feel they were equal participants in the political process. Both these assumptions are now problematic, as several factors have been at work in the past three decades that challenge this conventional wisdom.

Wahhabi influence

The first is the increasing influence of Saudi Wahhabism and related forms of Salafism on Islam as practised in the Indian subcontinent. This is the result of several inter-related variables but the most important of these is the vast increase in employment opportunities in the energy-rich West Asian countries following the oil boom of the 1970s. This resulted in many Indians of all faiths temporarily locating to these countries in search of higher earnings. While a much larger number of Indians belonging to other religions moved to West Asia in search of lucrative jobs, both white and blue-collar, the religio-cultural impact of the encounter with the fundamentalist form of Islam followed in these countries, especially Saudi Arabia, on a section of Indian Muslim emigrants was qualitatively different.

Several of these temporary migrants returned to India enamoured with the obscurantist ethos of these oil-rich countries. This fascination was publicly exhibited above all in the adoption by a section of Muslim women, often under patriarchal pressure, of an ultraconservative dress code, including the niqab, or full face covering, popular in Saudi Arabia and some other West Asian countries. This dress code is very different from the traditional concept of purdah (covering up or modesty) practised by conservative Muslim families in the Indian subcontinent.

Protected by Sufism

But this display of presumed orthodoxy constituted merely the tip of the iceberg. The impact of Wahhabi/Salafi Islam on the mindset of a segment of returnees, who also passed on their preferences to a much larger group of relatives and acquaintances already impressed by the former’s newly acquired prosperity, was more profound. Islamic beliefs and practices among some Indian Muslims began to approximate the harsh Wahhabi dogma, which stands in stark contrast to the indigenous version of Islam in India. The vast majority of Muslims in the Indian subcontinent belong to the Hanafi sect based on the most liberal school of Islamic jurisprudence.

Moreover, traditionally Indian Islam has been greatly influenced by Sufi teachings and is, therefore, tolerant and accepting of religious diversity. Visitors to major Sufi shrines, such as those of Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti in Ajmer and Nizamuddin Aulia in Delhi, where people of all confessions come to pray and seek blessings, can testify to the syncretic spirit of Indian Islam. Consequently, it harbours natural defences against extremism in belief and practice. The ideological infiltration of Wahhabism/Salafism has eroded some of these defences and made a section of Muslims more insular and, therefore, open to extremist ideas.

Equally important, the spectacular rise of Hindutva or Hindu nationalism from the 1990s has had a major psychological impact on a section of Muslim youth, prompting their estrangement from the national mainstream. Inter-religious riots in which Muslims suffered disproportionately had been common in India since Independence. In some cases the police killed Muslim youth in fake encounters. The Hashimpura massacre in Uttar Pradesh by members of the Provincial Armed Constabulary in 1987 was the most macabre example of such incidents.

However, until the 1990s the vast majority of Indian Muslims treated such occurrences as aberrations and their belief in the secular and non-discriminatory character of the Indian state remained unshaken. The demolition in 1992 of the Babri mosque by a Hindu mob under the direction of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) luminaries and the riots that ensued, in which scores of Muslims lost their lives, shook the confidence of many Muslims in the secular character of the Indian state. What was most galling was the Central government’s apathy in the face of this brazen act of mob violence despite the fact that it had been forewarned. This event began the process of alienation among a section of Muslim youth from the Indian state.

This feeling grew exponentially a decade later in 2002 with the massacre of about 1,000 Muslims in Gujarat under BJP rule to avenge the death of 59 kar sevaks who were burnt to death in a train at Godhra after an altercation with local Muslims. What added insult to injury was the inaction, or, as the Human Rights Watch report on the bloodbath put it, the refusal of the state machinery to protect Muslim citizens.

More recently, the disenchantment caused by these earlier events has been reinforced by the lynching of several Muslims in northern and central India on the pretext that they were taking cows for slaughter or eating beef. The lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq in Dadri, in western Uttar Pradesh, in 2015 on suspicion that he had stored beef in his house was the most chilling example of such incidents. It was followed by additional acts of mob violence carried out with relative impunity by the so-called gau rakshak (cow protector) vigilantes. Such incidents have led to a widespread feeling among Indian Muslims that the state, instead of providing security to them, now colludes with those determined to intimidate them into submission. This series of actions and reactions makes it evident that the growth of Hindu nationalism has acted as a major stimulus for the radicalisation of a section of Muslim society in India and that the two phenomena feed off each other.

Onus on governing elites

Opinion leaders and religious scholars from within the Muslim community have the primary duty to confront and defeat the malign Wahhabi-Salafi influence on Indian Muslims in order to preserve the liberal and syncretic nature of Indian Islam thus pre-empting the spread of extremist ideology among Muslim youth. However, the impact of the growth of Hindu nationalism on the Muslim psyche can be countered only by the policies and actions of the governing elites at the Centre and in the States. Only they can take concrete steps, such as quick and impartial action against those responsible for creating mayhem in the name of religion, to reassure Muslims that the state will not shirk its responsibility of providing them physical security and ensuring that they are treated with fairness and dignity. This will be the best antidote to the percolation of radical ideas among Muslim youth by removing their sense of alienation from the Indian state that in the long run can threaten the country’s security.

Mohammed Ayoob is University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of International Relations, Michigan State University and Non-Resident Senior Fellow, Center for Global Policy, Washington DC

Source: 11/02/2019

No respite from poverty for Muslims

Government intervention is required to improve educational and economic indicators

The National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) labour force survey reports that the economic condition of Muslims does not show any signs of improvement despite India being the fastest-growing large economy. An analysis of the data on economic and educational indicators for various religious groups reveals that Muslims are facing a vicious circle of poverty.

Lowest education levels

The NSSO’s 68th round (2011-12) provides estimates of education levels and job market indicators across major religious communities in India. The educational attainment of Muslims is the least among all these communities. In urban areas, the number of male Muslim postgraduates is as low as 15 per 1,000. This number is about four times lower than that of other communities, including Hindus, Christians and Sikhs. The situation is similar for Muslim women. The number of male graduates among Muslims is 71 per 1,000, less than even half the number of graduates (per 1,000) in other communities. Similarly, the number of Muslims educated up to the secondary and higher secondary levels is 162 and 90 per 1,000 persons, respectively, again the least among all the communities.

Poor achievement at higher levels of education is partly a reflection of sinilarly low levels of school education or of illiteracy. Around half the Muslim population over 15 years is either illiterate or has only primary or middle school education. The number of illiterate people is highest among Muslims (190 per 1,000), followed by Hindus (84), Sikhs (79) and Christians (57). The number of persons (over 15 years) who have obtained just primary or middle school education among Muslims is 257 and 198 (per 1,000 persons), respectively. Thus, as compared to other communities, the distribution of the Muslim population is least at the higher levels of education and highest at the lower levels of education.

Likewise, the current attendance rate among Muslims is least across all age groups. The number of Muslim males of 5-14 years in urban areas attending educational institutions is 869 per 1,000 persons, which is the least among all religious groups. It is higher among Christians (981), followed by Sikhs (971), though it is lower among Hindus (955), possibly because Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes have lower rates. The gaps in the current attendance rates of Muslims and those of other religious groups are increasingly pronounced at higher age groups.

That Muslims have the lowest attendance rates and educational attainment, especially in higher education, can be explained by their income level and higher costs for post-secondary education. According to the NSSO survey, the average per capita consumption expenditure (used as an indicator of income) among Muslims is just Rs. 32.66 per day, which is the least among all religious groups. It is highest among Sikhs (Rs. 55.30), followed by Christians (Rs. 51.43) and Hindus (Rs. 37.50). As per the 71st NSSO survey on education (2014), the average course fee for college degrees in technical courses in government and private unaided institutions was Rs. 25,783 and Rs. 64,442, respectively. That is too high for Muslims to afford, given their per capita income.

Although children up to age 14 have a right to free and compulsory education, the average course fee per student for upper primary education is still Rs. 508 for the academic session. While the course fee is the same for all religious groups, its burden is highest among Muslims due to their per capita income. The course fee for upper primary education accounts for 8.5% of the yearly per capita spending for Muslims, followed by Hindus (7.4%), Christians (5.4%) and Sikhs (5.03%). The higher burden of the cost of education among Muslims, relative to their incomes, could be one of the factors responsible for their lowest attendance rates.

The high level of illiteracy among Muslims and the low levels of general education ensure that they are trapped in a vicious circle of poverty. The lack of higher education is adversely affecting their job indicators. The dynamics of labour markets are largely a function of the degrees of knowledge and skills. For example, the labour force participation rate (LFPR), defined as the number of persons either employed or seeking jobs, is significantly linked to the desire for work, which in turn is dependent upon educational attainment. Similarly, the quality of employment is strongly linked to levels of education and skills. Therefore, if a community is lagging in education, it risks being trapped in a vicious circle of poverty. This is a situation that is difficult to break out of without government intervention.

The signs of Indian Muslims being caught in a vicious circle of poverty are visible in terms of their low consumption expenditure and poor job market indicators, including LFPR, employment status, and worker population ratio. The NSSO data show that LFPR among Muslims is 342 and 337 (per 1,000) in urban and rural areas, respectively, the least among all the religious communities. This implies that only 342 persons per 1,000 persons of working age among Muslims in urban areas are employed or available for work. Similarly, the LFPR among Muslim women is worse than that among women of other communities. Given that Muslims live predominantly in urban areas (unlike other poorer communities like SCs/STs), where work outside the home could be available, this low LFPR is likely explained by their low levels of education.

Likewise, the worker population ratio (WPR), defined as the number of persons employed per 1,000 persons, is lowest among Muslims, both in rural and urban areas. Further, among urban males, the number of Muslims employed in regular jobs is only 288 per 1,000 employed persons, while the corresponding figure among urban Muslim females is merely 249, which is the lowest among all other communities. The number of regular employees per 1,000 employed persons is higher among Christians (494 among urban males and 647 among urban females), followed by Hindus (463 and 439), and Sikhs (418 and 482). Similarly, the proportion of households with their major source of income from regular salaried jobs is the lowest among Muslims.

What could be done

The Central and State governments could take concerted steps to help Indian Muslims escape this vicious circle of poverty. One way to improve their situation is to provide a special incentive and subsidy system for higher education. That will ensure that schoolgoing students continue to higher levels of schooling and higher education. Similarly, students who don’t wish to continue in general academic education must have access to vocational education from Class 9 onwards.

Irfan Ahmad Sofi is Assistant Professor of Economics, BGSB University, Rajouri (irfan.sofi@bgsbu.ac.in). Santosh Mehrotra is Professor and Chairperson, Centre for Labour, JNU (santoshmeh@gmail.com)

Source: The Hindu, 6/11/2018

My books, my truths

My work reflects the lived realities of marginalised communities. A methodology that depends on secondary data cannot do justice to first-hand knowledge

A member of the Delhi University’s Standing Committee for Academic Affairs, among the teachers who demanded that three of my books be removed from the university’s curricula, argued that “Ilaiah’s understanding of the Hindu faith is wrong and there is no empirical data to establish his understanding”. Let me refer to three of my books: God As Political Philosopher: Buddha’s challenge to Brahminism, Why I am Not a Hindu: A Sudra critique of Hindutva philosophy, culture and political economy and Post-Hindu India: A discourse on Dalit-Bahujan socio-spiritual and scientific revolution.

The first book evolved out of my PhD thesis on ancient Indian political thought; hence it is well referenced and has a lot of citations. The other two books — they have been questioned by Delhi University’s committee — are full of data pertaining to Dalit-Bahujan, upper Shudra, Adivasi and Brahmin-Bania communities, largely from the Telugu-speaking region. They are about lived realities, work, instruments, culture and social relations. They are products of years of field work and are not referenced for sound methodological reasons.

Historically, books are products of two kinds of quests: One, the search for knowledge and two, revisiting already codified knowledge. In ancient times, such quests were of two types. One pertained to spiritual issues. Such texts focussed on god. The Bible, Vedas and Quran are good examples of such literature.

The other kind of literature was produced by people who looked for knowledge in their own milieu and in other environments. First-hand information about peoples’ lives cannot draw from other books for the simple reason that there were none at all. Such knowledge can be verified by revisiting the subjects and sources.

Plato’s Republic and Aristotle’s Politics do not have modern-style references from other works. In India, the first ever social science writing of this kind was done by Kautilya. Hence, the Arthashastra does not have a reference list. Even Manu’s Dharmashastra was written in a similar manner. Such a search for knowledge, in my view, leads to the production of foundational texts.

Referencing and quoting other works is a modern practice. It evolved in the post-Renaissance times. The re-search method either borrows ideas from other literature or combines field work — empirical data collection — with an analysis of other texts. Scholars from the West re-searched the knowledge of peoples, classes and races and this endeavour led to the production of referenced literature. But even in the West, post-modernist writing has reverted to the method of not using quotes.

Books that are based on information about people’s lived experiences — habits, social relations, imaginations, food culture, even philosophy — have changed the way knowledge is constructed. Such works do not rely on quotations.

Modernist scholarship — the so-called nationalist and Marxist schools — and Hindu fundamentalist academicians do not accept the post-modernist search method. According to them, to be eligible for a PhD degree, a work should rely on the modernist re-search method. The Hindutva academic school is the most backward of them. This school recognises books that cite the Vedas, Ramayana, Mahabharata, Arthashastra, Dharmashastra, V D Savarkar’s Hindutva:Who Is a Hindu, M S Golwalkar’s Bunch of Thoughts and so on. The others, of course, insist on quotations from multiple sources.

I confronted a major methodological problem during the anti-Mandal agitation in the 1990s. How to defend reservations? There was no quotation-based literature to defend reservation. At that time, Indian Marxists quoted from the writings of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao. I departed from the citation-based methodology and wrote an article in the Economic and Political Weekly, “Reservations: Experience as a Framework of Debate”. That piece made many anti-reservationists re-think their positions.

I then realised that one cannot draw on written texts to learn about the history, culture and lived experiences of the Shudras, OBCs, Dalits and Adivasis. The Vedas, epics such as the Ramayana and Mahabharata and the writings of Kautilya and Manu do not reflect the knowledge of these people. Modernist works also did not do justice to such knowledge. My first major attempt to bring such knowledge to light led me to write, Why I am not a Hindu. Shashi Tharoor’s Why I am a Hindu adopts a diametrically-opposite method — it draws from several other books. Hence, there is no original statement in that book.

Post-Hindu India draws on a much more rigorous collection of information from Adivasis, Dalits, OBCs and upper Shudras as well as Banias and Brahmins. It tries to deal with every major community. I could not re-search about their instruments, skills, proverbs and philosophy and past by drawing on secondary data. I had to do first-hand work in villages. For theoretical justification, I did not quote anybody because no one has done work on these people.

I formulated my theoretical positions in much the same way as Plato, Aristotle or Kautilya. Like these savants, I was also not unbiased. What many academicians do not understand is that the caste compartmentalisation of Indian society has not allowed a holistic construction of knowledge about the country. We have not been good at experimenting with newer ways of writing and building knowledge. Universities have to do that.

My training in a regional university allowed me to retain a productive association with several communities. I have been an activist, apart from a being a teacher. This is an area where the nationalist, Marxist and Hindu fundamentalist schools of academicians have, unfortunately, failed us. A scholar conducting such experiments at the PhD level is unlikely to get a degree. That was why I used the traditional method to write my PhD.

The intellectuals from the RSS/BJP do not want the political philosophy of Gautam Buddha to be taught in our universities. There is no codified political philosophy of Sri Ram. There is some philosophy of Sri Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita but that has to be examined from the point of view of the agrarian producers — not the priest and politician.

Universities are meant to be breeding grounds for change. The discovery of new methods of writing should come from them. They should not be fearful of change. All those who oppose my books must read them and tear them apart in their writings. That will help students.

The writer is director, Centre for Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy (CSSEIP) at Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad

Source: Indian Express, 27/10/2018

The lack of upward mobility among Muslims is our democracy’s failure

The historical and political marginalisation of Muslims is significant. The political mobilisation around communities explicitly work against Muslims

Mobility has been a hall mark of growth and democracy. The myth of mobility is one of the moral myths of the growth century around the legend of Horatio Alger. Even Benjamin Franklin’s moral adages were tips for upward mobility. The study of mobility once caught in acts of storytelling has now become a methodological conscious exercise. The search for certified indices of mobility is acute, and a study by Sam Asher, Paul Novosad and Charlie Rafkin is a methodologically self-conscious about mobility. The research focuses on upward mobility of an inter-generation kind and the insights it offers are revealing. In fact, in its neutrality, the Asher study amplifies its political implications.

The study focusses not on the income, but educational mobility. The three findings must be stated explicitly. Firstly, if one separates Muslims and the SC/ST from the rest of the population, upward mobility for the rest of the population is happily comparable to the United States. Secondly, upward mobility has improved significantly for the SC/ST population. Almost all the mobility gains that have accrued are a result of political mobilisation. Oddly the upper classes have not suffered though they have mobilised against affirmative action. It is the third finding which is devastating to swallow. Intergenerational mobility has been negligible for Muslims. It is as if democracy in an electoral sense has worked more for OBCs and SC/STs but not for Muslims. Neither liberalisation nor democracy has offered much to Muslims in terms of opportunity. The Asher study is based on educational mobility because economic income data has been sparse. Educational mobility can be measured more precisely than income mobility. While parsing the data one also finds that mobility in urban areas is significantly higher than rural areas. The gap between urban and rural is equivalent to the gap between upper castes and SCs. The gap is also higher in the North rather than the South.

The study argues that the historical and political marginalisation of Muslims is significant. It emphasises that the political mobilisation around communities explicitly work against Muslims. The discrimination is overt. A paper in the Economic and Political weekly estimated that displacement from riots is the second biggest demographic displacement after dams. Studies of riots especially in Gujarat reveal that victims unlike earlier do not return to their homes. Violence not only breaks the mentality of hope but prevents a consolidation of income which mobility requires.

Social policy has been as relevant as violence. Group strategies have targeted people belonging to the SCs/STs. Asher states that he can cite no major policy which specifically works on the amelioration of Muslim disadvantages. This is a point that social critique has to recognise and discuss. Muslims in India face the stark fact of stagnation, if not downward mobility.

The nature of education may also be problematic. SC/ST groups tend to access secular mainstream schools which are more open to the society. Madrasa education tends to be provincial, often regressive, and makes only nominal acknowledgements to the demands of education and mobility. To this regressive policy, we now have to add the fact, that the current regime polices food, dress and the real estate of the city in a way that it becomes disadvantageous to this religious minority. The Muslim status in an inter-generational sense offers little hope. The situation of women must be even more hopeless. What one senses is a missing-ness of both strategies to improve Muslim education and strategies to link this to the political economy. Democracy as an imagination has failed Muslims. This I believe is one of the biggest benchmarks of the Indian democracy. It is a fact democracy needs to discuss.

Shiv Visvanathan is professor, Jindal Global Law School and director, Centre for Study of Knowledge Systems, OP Jindal Global University

Source: Hindustan Times, 23/10/2018

Renewing The Community

Triple talaq debate shows how Muslim women are challenging patriarchy

When our only argument for protecting the custom of triple talaq becomes that “not enough people are affected by it”, we clearly need to rethink what we understand by the rule of law and democracy, and perhaps recognise the colonial undertones of the logic of “non-interference” in the face of injustice. In a recent op-ed in The Indian Express (‘Unimportance of triple talaq’, IE, May 29), we find a rather luxurious use of statistics to make the argument that triple talaq, in fact, occurs extremely infrequently (0.4 per cent reported cases in a quoted survey). Clearly, now not only do surveys place “your stats versus mine”, but also use data to trivialise the very real struggles of many women.

It is certainly true that triple talaq is only the tip of the iceberg — focusing merely on the “spontaneity” or the haste in which a divorce is given serves to blur the larger problem of how such divorces are unilateral, an exclusive privilege of men. What makes this divorce “arbitrary” is not simply the spontaneous utterance of the word “talaq”, but the problematic notion that women are required to qualify their decisions under the codified provisions of the Dissolution of Muslim Marriages Act, 1939, whereas men are not. The grounds for divorce for women are clearly laid out — men need not cite any.

Thus, simply de-recognising talaq-ul-bidat and encouraging talaq-e-ahsan or talaq-e-hasan, which takes place over three months for men, still doesn’t address the fact that women lose their right to alimony and maintenance if they initiate divorce themselves under khula.

The problem is hardly exclusive to Muslim personal law. It stretches across religious law codes. For instance, till 2001, under Christian divorce law, men could seek a divorce on the grounds of adultery, but Christian women were required to prove not just adultery but cruelty as well in order to get a divorce. Under Hindu law, even after codification, it was not until 2005 that inheritance and succession law anomalies were addressed. There remains scope for much more legal reform in that direction.

Thus, trying to stall the triple talaq debate by citing small numbers is simply diversionary. The logic of “hardly any effected parties” was precisely what was relied on when many argued in favour of keeping Section 377 intact; homosexuality till date remains a criminal offence. If anything, the fact that the provision is hardly ever used is evidence of its redundancy in this age. While the fear about the debate becoming embroiled in politics is legitimate in times when lynch mobs decide menus and laws threaten to criminalise certain food preferences, the triple talaq phenomenon is different.

For a substantial period during the debates on personal law, one of the most oft-repeated statements has been about letting “reform come from within”. What we are currently seeing is a difficult, but healthy conversation between co-religionists about the interpretations of the Quran and Hadees. Women who had long been excluded from membership to the clergy across religions are now not simply relying on their “constitutional rights” or protections from the state. They are instead challenging the monopoly of men over matters of religion. This is a moment that marks the emergence of a new Muslim woman, who does not cower behind an all-male clergy that dictates to her, her own religion.

It is heartening to see two women recently appointed as qazis in Jaipur; one glass ceiling less for the women of India. Women are no longer faced with the awkward and unfair binary between “rights and religion” to choose from. They are demanding both. Remember that Shah Bano, the woman whose case (1985) triggered a storm that led the judiciary to enter the domain of the legislature and demand a uniform civil code, had in fact withdrawn her case, much before the Muslim Women’s Protection of Rights on Divorce Act, 1986 formally overturned

the Supreme Court judgement. Given this backdrop, it is extremely important to acknowledge that the new women’s movement is pulling off a bigger achievement, of attempting to salvage religion from the clutches of patriarchy. The numbers game must be rejected here. If the custom in question was sati, not triple talaq, would we still be making the argument that “very few” are affected by it, and therefore, it should be considered beyond the realm of judicial interpretation or legislative intervention?

While legal interventions certainly cannot be the finish line of feminist pursuits or social reform more generally, we cannot write off any form as discrimination as too minor to deserve a movement of its own.

The writer has a PhD in legal history from Cambridge University. She has worked with the Justice Verma Committee in 2012-2013. Views expressed are personal

Source: Indianexpress, 30-5-2017

Remake the marriage contract

Nikahnamas that bar triple talaq could work much better than making the practice illegal.

A man issued a matrimonial advertisement seeking an extremely beautiful bride who should be tall, highly educated and from a reputed family. North Indians will be preferred, girls from the North-East and South India need not respond, it said. Hundreds of profiles were received, but he married someone who had not even responded and was an illiterate, ugly-looking, short and poor girl, whose father was from the North-East and mother from Madras. A PIL is filed in the apex court, challenging the constitutionality of this marriage with prayers for the annulment of a marriage which was based on the arbitrary and instant decision of this man. The PIL seeks the declaration of such marriages as a punishable crime.

The triple divorce case challenging its constitutionality is somewhat similar to the above situation, particularly in terms of the remedy being sought. The concept of constitutionality is intimately related to state action. The constitutionality of a law can be tested only on two grounds. First, on the issue of the competence of the legislature. Secondly, the law in question should not be in contravention of fundamental rights. It is difficult to say to what extent we can strike down private, personal decisions between husband and wife as unconstitutional.

Article 15 permits discrimination on the basis of religion, race and caste when it comes to the use of private wells, tanks and bathing ghats, which are not maintained out of state funds or are not dedicated to the general public. Thus, a Brahmin may exclude Dalits from his private well and we cannot challenge the constitutionality of his discriminatory private action.

What is the effect of something being declared unconstitutional? What can one say of private citizens, even governments do not care about things being held unconstitutional by the courts. Re-promulgation of ordinances has been held by the apex court to be not only unconstitutional but a fraud on the Constitution, yet theNarendra Modi government has re-promulgated land and enemy property ordinances. Men will continue to give triple divorce and women willing to continue in such bad relationships will be able to get a verdict of non-dissolution of marriage only after years of costly and time-consuming legal battles.

A husband and wife cannot be and should not be forced to love each other. Holding a husband liable for maintenance is one thing but compelling him to continue in marriage against his will is another. In most cases, what to say of husbands, even wives who have been given triple divorce would not be willing to live with such husbands; yet, the courts will force them too to suffer a failed marriage. Polygamy is a serious crime for Hindus, yet many Hindus do practice bigamy. Thus, outlawing polygamy too is not a pragmatic solution.

Muslim marriage is, after all, a civil contract, though a sacrosanct one. On Tuesday, the Allahabad High Court made a few unnecessary observations when the apex court is seized of the matter. In any case, the court is wrong in saying that marriage being a contract cannot be unilaterally terminated. All contracts can be terminated unilaterally; of course, one has to pay damages as per the contractual terms.

The marriage contract or nikahnama (prenuptial contracts) is the easy solution to the problems at hand — polygamy, triple divorce and halala. The historian Shireen Moosvi has collected several marriage contracts of the Mughal period which demonstrate a uniform pattern of the conditions of nikahnama. These bar domestic violence, prohibit the husband from marrying another woman and bar him from leaving the wife for long periods. Any violation of any of these conditions entitled the wife to divorce the husband or get the marriage annulled. Most marriage contracts also included the stringent condition that prohibited a husband from keeping a slave girl. But, if the husband did keep a slave girl, the wife had the right to take her away, or sell her and keep the proceeds.

These conditions were so common that there were nikahnamas which simply mention that marriage is subject to the four well-known conditions. The Supreme Court may make inclusion of the first three conditions mentioned above, mandatory in every nikahnama. Since slavery is no longer valid, the prohibition of instant triple divorce could be the fourth condition.

Such contracts were routinely enforced by British judges in India though under classical British law, pre-nupital agreements were considered against public policy. The Poonoo Bibi v. Puex Push case (1875) gives us a glimpse of progressive marriage contracts. In this case, at the time of marriage the husband had said: “I shall never give trouble in feeding and clothing you; I shall make over to you and nobody else whatever I shall draw from employment; I shall never exercise any violence on you; I shall not take you away from your home; I shall not marry or make nikah without your permission; I shall do nothing without your permission; If I do anything without your permission, you will be at liberty to divorce me and realise from me the amount of dower forthwith and this nikah will then be null and void.” But Poono was deserted. She got the contract enforced in spite of her husband’s assertion that the contract reduced him to the status of a slave despite the abolition of slavery, and so it was void.

Let the prohibition on polygamy and triple divorce be included in the nikahnama and once triple divorce goes, halala too will automatically go as in revocable divorces, parties can remarry without halala.

The writer is Vice-Chancellor, NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad. Views are personal

Source:Indian Express, 11-05-2017

Not majority vs minority

Reconfigure triple talaq debate: It is about individual freedom and equality vs coercion and subordination

The offensive and reactionary position taken by the All India Muslim Personal Law Board against reform of triple talaq is a reminder of the institutional cul de sac we have driven ourselves into on issues of personal law reform and common civil code. The All India Muslim Personal Law Board’s authority is itself dubious, and antithetical to the values and modes of reasoning of a progressive democracy. It represents the worst combination of a patriarchal, non-representative institution, shored up by the contingencies of electoral politics that often caves in to the most reactionary elements within communities. It marginalises other voices in the community, seems to have open contempt for women, and is, frankly, a political liability. It could, over the years, have been an instrument for progressive change, responding to demands from below within the community. Instead, it has chosen to act as a fossilised bulwark against justice.

Majoritarianism is a real issue. It is hard to discuss these issues when the risks of majoritarian intimidation are high. But the fear that discussions of personal law reform, or a common civil code, are nothing but majoritarian ruses to intimidate minorities, has now become an intellectually disabling and politically self-fulfilling argument. Often, arguments for a common civil code are made under false pretences of nationalism rather than justice. But that is, in part, because secular and progressive forces vacated that space. No one should underestimate the complexity of the issues involved in working towards a common civil code or equal rights.

Reactionary socially conservative positions of successive governments on a range of legal issues should give us pause on just how long the road to justice will be. The constant appeals by government to “our ethos” rather than public reason (most recently on the surrogacy bill), undermine confidence in the possibility of clear-headed normative arguments. But the AIMPLB’s recourse to specious religious arguments reinforces the legitimacy of ethos-based majoritarian arguments.

One conceptual move necessary to combat communal constructions is this. Every community, majority or minority, often appeals to the thought that something must not be imposed on them if they do not consent to it. The problem is that communities do not often extend the same courtesy to individuals within them. We have tied ourselves in knots trying to distinguish Indian secularism from its other variants, in castigating liberalism as a foreign ideology. But all that liberalism requires to get started is extending the courtesy of the very same argument that communities use to keep other communities out, to individuals within them. The freedom from another community cannot be the freedom to oppress within. As far as possible, we want to live under social arrangements that honour our standing as free and equal individuals. The battle in India is not between majorities and minorities. It is between forces and institutions in each community that want to bend the arc of history away from freedom and equality in the personal space, and forces that want to claim those rights. This is a contest that cuts across communities with varying degrees of intensity. But it is something of an own goal when secularists, rather than reconfiguring the debate as one between freedom and equality on the one hand and coercion and subordination on the other, also come to be invested in the contest of compulsory identities. The only way the long-term threat of majoritarianism can be dissolved is by moving the axis of contest away from the majority-minority distinction, to equal protection of individual rights, freedom and dignity. It is hard to imagine authorities like the AIMPLB even understanding this idea.

As Flavia Agnes, one of the most thoughtful and grounded contributors to this debate has pointed out, we must be wary of a lot of communal myth-making in this area. It is not only minorities who have been advocates of personal law. The Hindu Code Bill, with all its reform elements, was a sectarian reform aimed as much at consolidating a unified Hindu legal identity, as it was aimed at progressive social reform. Arguably the contractual framework for marriage in Islam can be more easily adapted to modern marriage laws than sacramental conceptions. Muslim personal law has also been subject to reform. Despite the cowardly abdication by the Congress in the Shah Bano affair, the Supreme Court has incrementally introduced reform, without opposition, it has to be said. (most notably in the Daniel Latifi case). So, arguably, there is propitious ground for serious, good faith conversation on the issue.

The conversation has to be oriented to the future. For this reason, its sole concern has to be freedom, equality and justice, not nationalism or selective narratives of which community was more oppressive in the past. It is high time we rescued that conversation from being held hostage by three forces: Bodies like the Muslim Personal Law Board that are non-representative and reactionary, Hindutva ideologies that are interested in using the issue to demonise minorities than to expand the space for freedom, and some secularists whose politics of fear has given them an investment in the war of identities rather than the expansion of rights.

The real challenge we should focus on is not the interplay between religion and law. No religious conception can have a veto over the transformative promise of the constitution. The challenge is crafting laws that in addition to being principled, are practical in the context of our state capacities and sociological realities. For instance, as Flavia Agnes has pointed out in her tour d’ force essay in the Oxford Handbook to the Indian Constitution, often reformed laws can have unintended consequences. Outlawing does not seem to have had as much effect on the actual practice of bigamy among Hindus as was hoped, for instance; indeed, the law perversely fails to give protection to people in these relationships because it does not recognise them. In other areas of law, we have also seen the limits of law induced change; often expecting the law to do too much can be counterproductive. Law is effective only when society meets it at least half-way. The real reform debate should not be over one community’s virtues versus the others; it should be about closing the gap between the demands of freedom and equality and social practice.

Whether equal rights within different laws responds to this challenge better than a common civil code, can be debated. But the goal of freedom for all individuals is the best antidote to majoritarianism. We need conversations, institutions, processes that move us in that direction, not trap us in suffocating constructs of majority and minority.

The writer is president, CPR Delhi and contributing editor,‘Indian Express’

Source: Indian Express, 6-09-2016

Census data on Muslim family size can help counter myths

n an ideal world, Indians should not be quibbling about the details of people following various religions. But the times are such that some numbers are useful in getting a better understanding of the country to dispel propaganda, lies and half-truths. Details of the 2011 Census revealed last week showed that India’s average household size was 4.45 members, down from 4.67 a decade ago.

The size of an average Muslim household fell to 5.15 from 5.61 over the previous decade. Notably the reduction was sharper at 11.1% for Muslim households headed by men while for families headed by women it was 4.47%. The average size of Hindu families declined by 5 % over the decade. Such data should help us counter myths being propagated to create perceptions that fan social tensions.

The old slogan, “Small families are happy families” should ring better in a developing country that has seen a population explosion. The fact that the average size of a Muslim household is shrinking faster than that of the Hindu counterpart indicates that both communities are headed in the right direction and are increasingly on comparable ground.

The data signals that perceived threats to communities based on demographic bogeys are unwarranted. Last year, BJP member of parliament Sakshi Maharaj said every Hindu woman must produce at least four children to “protect” the community. Such statements fan tensions in far-flung areas, while actually, the attempt should be to not only shrink the size of the average family but also challenge outmoded notions of women being treated as child-bearing machines.

Given that Muslim personal law allows polygamy, casual banter and malicious propaganda by Right-wing hardliners have sometimes raised concerns about the growth of the nation’s Muslim population.

Census data for 2011 showed last year that Hindus made up 79.8% of the population, down 0.7 percentage points over the decade, while Muslims were 14.2% of the country, up 0.8 percentage points. Last week’s data puts the issue in a clearer context because absolute numbers are not everything. Over time, a better balance seems to be emerging.

Source: Hindustan Times, 24-05-2016

Muslims have largest share of young, but also die early

Subodh Varma





Census Shows Drop In U-20s In All Communities

Muslims in India have the highest share of children and teenagers among all religions, at 47%, compared to 40% for Hindus, according to Census 2011 data released on Tuesday . If all communities are taken together, around 41% of the country's population is below 20 years old and 9% above 60 years, leaving 50% in the intervening 20-59 age group.Overall, life cycles of different religious communities in India have shown common trends of declining proportion of children and increasing shares of elderly while also showing marked differences in average life span.
The share of the young population has declined since the previous Census in 2001 when it was 45% for the whole country , 44% for Hin dus, 52% for Muslims and 35% for Jains. This is a reflection of across-the-board declines in fertility rates -number of children born -leading to a slowing down of the respective population growth rates. The decline is the least for Hindus and highest for Buddhists and Christians, at seven percentage points, followed by Sikhs and Jains at six percentage points.
At the other end of the life cycle, the proportion of elderly has risen across all communities as life spans have generally increased. The elderly , 60 years and above, make up about nine percent of the country's population.
Across religious communities, there is considerable variation in the share of the elderly population, which can be directly linked to economic status and access to healthcare. In the Muslim community, just 6.4% of the population is over 60 years, almost 50% lower than the national average. In 2001, this share was 5.8%, indicating only a marginal increase. Among Jains, and Sikhs, the share of elderly is 12%, over 30% more than the national average. These shares are more also because the younger generation's numbers are less. The Hindu community is close to all national averages because they make up nearly 80% of the country's population.
Age-wise population shares reveal another important aspect of the lives of people dependency . Both chil dren and the elderly are dependent on the able and adult population. Overall, the young dependency ratio -number of children aged up to 15 dependent on every 1,000 members of the working age population -has declined from 621 in 2001 to 510 in 2011.This is a direct consequence of declining number of children.
At the other end of life, the old dependency ratio has increased from 131 in 2001 to 142 in 2011, in accord with the growing elderly population.
If we add up both young and old, in 2001, 752 people were dependent on every 1,000 persons in the working age population of 15 to 59 years. Compared to that, in 2011, this ratio has come down to 652. Across religious communities, Muslims have the highest total dependency ratio of 748 compared to the lowest ratio for Jains which is just 498. For Hindus, the ratio is 640. All these ratios have declined since 2001.

Source: Times of India, 13-01-2016

What is the difference between Sunnis and Shias

audi Arabia’s execution of Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr could escalate tensions in the Muslim world even further. Here is a primer on the basic differences between Sunni and Shia Islam.

What caused the split?

A schism emerged after the death of the Prophet Muhammad in 632. He died without appointing a successor to lead the Muslim community, and disputes arose over who should shepherd the new and rapidly growing faith.

Some believed that a new leader should be chosen by consensus; others thought that only the prophet’s descendants should become caliph. The title passed to a trusted aide, Abu Bakr, though some thought it should have gone to Ali, the Prophet’s cousin and son-in-law. Ali eventually did become caliph after Abu Bakr’s two successors were assassinated.

After Ali also was assassinated, with a poison-laced sword at the mosque in Kufa, in what is now Iraq, his sons Hasan and then Hussein claimed the title. But Hussein and many of his relatives were massacred in Karbala, Iraq, in 680.

His martyrdom became a central tenet to those who believed that Ali should have succeeded the Prophet. (It is mourned every year during the month of Muharram). The followers became known as Shias, a contraction of the phrase Shiat Ali, or followers of Ali. The Sunnis, however, regard the first three caliphs before Ali as rightly guided and themselves as the true adherents to the Sunnah, or the Prophet’s tradition. Sunni rulers embarked on sweeping conquests that extended the caliphate into North Africa and Europe. The last caliphate ended with the fall of the Ottoman Empire after World War-I.

How do their beliefs differ?

The Sunni and Shia sects encompass a wide spectrum of doctrine, opinion and schools of thought. The branches are in agreement on many aspects of Islam, but there are considerable disagreements within each. Both branches include worshippers who run the gamut from secular to fundamentalist.

Shias consider Ali and the leaders who came after him as Imams. Most believe in a line of 12 Imams, the last of whom, a boy, is believed to have vanished in the ninth century in Iraq after his father was murdered. Shias known as Twelvers anticipate his return as the Mahdi, or Messiah.

Sunnis emphasise God’s power in the material world, sometimes including the public and political realm, while Shias value martyrdom and sacrifice.

Which sect is larger, and where is each concentrated?

More than 85 per cent of the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims are Sunni. They live across the Arab world, as well as in countries such as Turkey, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Malaysia and Indonesia. Iran, Iraq and Bahrain are largely Shia. The Saudi royal family, which practices an austere and conservative strand of Sunni Islam known as Wahhabism, controls Islam’s holiest shrines, Mecca and Medina. Karbala, Kufa and Najaf in Iraq are revered shrines for the Shias. — New York Times News Service

Keywords: Islam, Shias, Sunnis, Saudi Arabia-Iran conflict, Shia Sunni conflict, Islam sectarian violence, Prophet Muhammad

Source: The Hindu, 5-01-2016

83% of Muslim women want family law codified, says survey





Should unilateral triple talaq be banned? An overwhelming number of Muslim women in the country think so.In a first of its kind study, the women have unequivocally voiced their dissent against the discriminatory practice of triple talaq with 92.1% seeking its ban. Oral talaq delivered through new media platforms like Skype, text messages, email and WhatsApp have become an increasing cause of worry for the community .
A study conducted across 10 states by NGO Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA) -working for reforms in Muslim personal law -found that a majority of the women were economically and socially disadvantaged, over half had been married before the age of 18 and had faced domestic violence.
The study , which interviewed 4,710 women between July and December 2013, reveals that 91.7% of the respondents opposed a second marriage by their husbands. About 73% of Muslim women surveyed by NGO Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA) were from families that earned less than Rs 50,000 annually and 55% were married before they turned 18. An overwhelming 82% had no property in their name and 78% were homemakers, indicating absence of income. Over 53% reported having faced domestic violence in their lives while a majority was poorly educated.
Despite these disadvantages, the women clearly spoke against unilateral, oral triple talaq and polygamy . “In 2014, of the 235 cases that came to women sharia adalats that we run, 80% were of oral talaq,“ author of the study , Za kia Soman said, adding that women were forced to bear the brunt of the practice.
Most women (93%) were in favour of an arbitration process before divorce and 83.3% believed that codification of Muslim family law would help get justice. Codification of Muslim personal law has been resisted by the community citing religious interference. Responding to this, Soman said, “Government has mollycoddled and appeased those groups which have taken upon themselves to speak for the community . It is our constitutional right. For groups that cite religious freedom as an argument, it is at the expense of women's rights.“
Co-author Noorjehan Safia Niaz said, “An overwhelming number of women demand reforms in Muslim personal law.They want an elaborate codified law based on the Quranic justice framework to cover matters such as age of marriage, divorce procedures, polygamy , maintenance and custody of children.“
BMMA plans to take up the issue with the government, Law Commission and the National Commission for Women.

Aug 21 2015 : The Times of India (Delhi)

92% of Muslim women in India want oral triple talaq to go: Study

Himanshi Dhawan

New Delhi:





Should unilateral triple talaq be banned? An overwhelming number of Muslim women in the country think so.In a first of its kind study, the women have unequivocally voiced their dissent against the discriminatory practice of triple talaq with 92.1% seeking its ban. Oral talaq delivered through new media platforms like Skype, text messages, email and WhatsApp have become an increasing cause of worry for the community .
A study conducted across 10 states by NGO Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA) -working for reforms in Muslim personal law -found that a majority of the women were economically and socially disadvantaged, over half had been married before the age of 18 and had faced domestic violence.
The study , which interviewed 4,710 women between July and December 2013, reveals that 91.7% of the respondents opposed a second marriage by their husbands. About 73% of Muslim women surveyed by NGO Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA) were from families that earned less than Rs 50,000 annually and 55% were married before they turned 18. An overwhelming 82% had no property in their name and 78% were homemakers, indicating absence of income. Over 53% reported having faced domestic violence in their lives while a majority was poorly educated.
Despite these disadvantages, the women clearly spoke against unilateral, oral triple talaq and polygamy . “In 2014, of the 235 cases that came to women sharia adalats that we run, 80% were of oral talaq,“ author of the study , Za kia Soman said, adding that women were forced to bear the brunt of the practice.
Most women (93%) were in favour of an arbitration process before divorce and 83.3% believed that codification of Muslim family law would help get justice. Codification of Muslim personal law has been resisted by the community citing religious interference. Responding to this, Soman said, “Government has mollycoddled and appeased those groups which have taken upon themselves to speak for the community . It is our constitutional right. For groups that cite religious freedom as an argument, it is at the expense of women's rights.“
Co-author Noorjehan Safia Niaz said, “An overwhelming number of women demand reforms in Muslim personal law.They want an elaborate codified law based on the Quranic justice framework to cover matters such as age of marriage, divorce procedures, polygamy , maintenance and custody of children.“
BMMA plans to take up the issue with the government, Law Commission and the National Commission for Women.

Jun 19 2014 : The Times of India (Delhi)

Muslim enrolment goes up in schools: HRD report

New Delhi TIMES NEWS NETWORK





Muslim enrolment in schools has gone up marginally while there has been a slight decline in case of the SC/ST community .
Children belonging to Other Backward Classes (OBCs) have shown a perceptible increase in enrolment.Data for 2013-14, released on Wednesday by HRD minister Smriti Z Irani, shows that as per the Educational Development Index, Puducherry is at number one, followed by Lakshadweep, Tamil Nadu, Himachal Pradesh and Delhi.
Despite massive privatization of school education, more than 60% of enrolment was in government schools, just over 8% in private aided schools, 27.8% in private unaided schools, 35.81% in private managements and over 2% in unrecognized schools.
Government-aided schools with private management dominated in Goa (63.03%), Kerala (42.36%) and Maharashtra (37.8%). Muslim enrolment at primary level went up marginally to 14.35% in 2013-14 from 14.20% in 2012-13. At the upper primary level, enrolment was 12.52%, up from 12.11% in the previous year.
In West Bengal, Gujarat, Bihar and UP, there was a gradual, although not significant, increase in enrolment. Enrolment of girls, both at primary and upper primary levels, remained unchanged at 49%.
At the primary level, OBC enrolment has gone up to 44.1% from 42.9%, while at the upper primary level, it went up to 44.44% from 43.66% in 2012-13. The most perceptible increase can be noticed in West Bengal, Puducherry and Kerala. Girls constitute nearly half of the new enrolments, at both primary and upper primary levels.
Enrolment of SC children at primary and upper primary levels came down to 19.72%, from 20.24% in 201213. Except for Himachal Pradesh and West Bengal, a marginal decline in SC enrolment can be seen in most states, especially Bihar, UP, MP and Maharashtra.
The percentage of teachers involved in non-teaching assignments to the total number of teachers has come down from 5.49% to 2.48%.