LET US
REMEMBER HOW IT ALL STARTED
This year the celebrated of Indian’s Independence Day on 15th of
August will not be the most pleasant celebration. We are living in difficult times. The Manipur situation had made international
headlines and even the Europeans Parliament has expressed their concern about
it. I will not be exaggerating is I say
that Manipur is being used as a laboratory for implementing Hindutva Rashtra by
launching violence against the minority.
Since the Muslim population in Manipur is insignificant the Christians
become the soft target. We Are in such
a situation in our country that we need to bring to our mind the history of independence.
The history of independence is probably most aptly narrated as the history of
India’s struggle for independence. What
we look for in our society what we can pass on to a younger generation about a
country is this story namely the struggle for independence. The narration of
the history of the struggle for independence contains in it the vision for
India, the kind of nation that the founding fathers of our nation wanted to
build. We have already completed 75
years of our independence. Looking back to it, we will discover that here are
many things that we will be proud of and there are many more things that we
have to be aware of and protect ourselves from.
The history of India’s struggle
for independence was also the struggle between different ideologies and
different visions for the nation. There was a major struggle between theory
called two nations theory, and there was another theory called one nation
theory. The Two Nation theory was propagated by the Muslim league under the
leadership of Mohammed Jinnah and the Hindutva people, represented by Mr.
Golwalkar. Both these conflicting
movements proposed that India should be based on the religious ideas, Islamic
State and Hindu nation. This theory is entailed in the idea that religion
should be defining characteristic of the nation. Mohammed Jinnah propose that
the religion of the state should be Islam and it is on this ground that he
demanded the formation of Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The Hindutva propagators
wanted India to be a Hindu nation. According
to the propagators of Hindutva nation, India belongs to the Hindu people.
There was a third idea of India propagated by Mahatma Gandhi,
Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel, Nehru, Subhash Candra Bose, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad
and many other great leaders and members of the Indian National Congress
freedom movement. These leaders believed that India should be a a secular
country, democratic and socialist state. State should be independent of any religion.
Neither religion should interfere in the state affairs nor the state should
give direction to the practice of religion by the people.
There has been a history of
struggle (communal conflicts) between the Hindus and Muslims. This was propagated and promoted by the
colonial rulers. It was the policy of
the British Raj to divide and rule. This attitude of the British saw India not
from the point of view of the welfare of the people, citizens of India, but the
benefit the Britishers can gain from India. The peace, harmony and well-being
of the people of India was not the concerns of the colonizers.
Mahatma Gandhi ji, Vallabhbhai Patel, Nehru and Maulana Abul Kalam
Azad mobilized people to fight against the divisive forces of communalism. Gandhi ji and the founding fathers had
understood that if we have to succeed in gaining independence and build a
prosperous and peaceful nation, communalism would be the greatest evil that
would make the job impossible. Apart from the two major religious groups India
also had many religious groups. Buddhist
had been there from 300 BC. Christians
have been there from year 50 AD, the Sikh, Jain, and even Jews have been there
for centuries. The Adivasis have their
own religion. India comprises of people
belonging to different cultures and religions.
Keeping in mind the diversities in the Indian people the founding
fathers fought for India as a secular state. Keeping religion and state apart
from each other Mahatma Gandhi ji was Hindu. He was deeply religious Hindu.
Four personalities on the horizon of freedom struggle:
Mohammad Jinnah. Mahatma Gandhi, V. D. Savarkar/ Golwalkar and M.
N. Roy represented different visions and ideologies and wanted India according
to their visions.
1. Mohammed Jinnah came to India in 1906. He had
finished his degree as barrister and returned to India. He was hard core
secular, liberal nationalist, follower of Dadabhai Naoroji, who was a
co-founder and president of the Indian National congress (1886-1887; 1893-1894
and 1906-1907. He was also a member of the second Communist International). Initially
as a staunch secular person, he was a strong opponent of the Muslim league. But gradually he began to change towards
Muslim communal person. When there was a demand for separate electorate for the
Muslims, he did not support the move.
But as time passed as the demand for the separate electorate gathered
momentum, he began to support this move. In 1924 he fully supported it. He
became so convinced that the rights of the Muslims could be violated by the
majority Hindus that he demanded for the separate electorate for the Muslims. He
had noticed the rise of Hindu Maha Sabha and demand for Hindu nation. He began
to believe that the Muslim community will not be safe in India with the
majorities Hindus. He had stated that in the majority Hindu state the Muslims
will not enjoy any rights and hands he propounded his two-nation theory and was
for separate statehood for the Muslims, the Islamic State of Pakistan. When we
talk about the theory of two-nation which was propagated by Mohammed Jinnah. He
claimed that the independent India would contain in itself two states based on
religion, Muslim state or Islamic State of Pakistan and Hindutva state of India.
By the way there was also an element of the ambition of Jinnah to
become a Prime Minister of India and going by the climate, Gandhiji did not
support this idea. Instead, he wanted
Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, given his strong secular credentials and clarity of
vision.
2. V.D. Savarkar and Mr. Golwalkar: In
the light of the Islamic communalism the Hindu communal leaders advanced their
communal agenda. Madan Mohan Malviya
along with others founded the Hindu Maha Sabha.
While initially it was a liberal communal movement it had gradually
taken a turn into a fascist force under V. D. Savarkar. He was of the opinion
that Hindus would become humiliated and dominated by the Muslims. They believed that their principal enemies
were the Muslims and only then came second d the British Colonial rule. Mr.
Golwalkar the main ideologue of Hindutva codified the RSS doctrine. In 1939 declared “we have allowed ourselves
to be duped into believing our old and bitter enemies and foes (the Muslims and
other minorities) to be our friends. He
demanded that the minorities must adopt the Hindu culture and language, must
learn to respect and hold in reverence Hindu religion, must entertain no idea
but those of glorification of Hindu race and culture. They must live fully
subordinated to the Hindu nation, claiming nothing deserving no privileges, far
less any preferential treatment, not even citizens’ right. Mr. Golwalkar propagated the idea of Unitary
form of the state, where all governing power resides in a centralized
government. One nation, one party, one
language, one religion.
In this context, there was clear support for the apprehension of
Mohammed Jinnah.
While Mohamed Jinnah demanded separate state for the Muslims,
Islamic State of Pakistan, the proponents of the Hindutva demanded that India
should be a Hindutva state, leaving second class citizen ship to the man or T,
Muslims and Christians. The proponents of the Hindutva ideology demanded to
implement two nation theory, the nation state of Hindutva, as against the
Islamic State of Pakistan.
3. The socialist group led by M.N. Roy: There
was another group of people under the leadership of MN Roy, who won the India
to follow the socialist path of development. M.N. Roy was the member of the
third international of the Communist. He had known Lenin and was educated,
socialist idea and a Bolshevik leadership in Russia, their idea was opposed
capitalism. They wanted to socialize the
means of production and equitable distribution of wealth among all the
citizens. The moment for the socialist form of society would be led by the
working class in alliance with the peasants. Communist movement was totally
opposed to the role for religion in the formation and functioning of the state
4. The fourth group was the leaders of the Indian national congress.
The main leaders of this party were Mahatma Gandhi ji, Sardar Vallabh Bhai
Patel Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru Muhammad Abdul Kalam, Subhas Chandra Bose: Mahatma Gandhiji advocated the path of
nonviolence satyagraha through which India should gain independence from the
British rule, Indian national congress Was united in their resolve to drive out
the colonial British rule from India.
Along with the anti-colonial world view, an ideological element
constituted the broad socio-economic-political vision of the Indian National
Movement. It was capitalist (bourgeois) independent economic development and a
secular republican, democratic, civil libertarian political order, both the
economic and political order based on principles of social equality. The national movement was fully committed to
Parliamentary democracy, representative form of government on the basis of
popular elections, civil liberty and freedom of association respecting even the
assemblies of people who want to discuss revolutionary projects. Civil liberty
consisting of non-violence.
At the beginning all these different factions Mohammad Jinnah’s
Muslim League, Hindu Maha Sabha, the Communist party were part of the congress
party. The communist party did not
question the major tenets of the National movement. The Communists did not believe in Gandhi’s
Concept of Swaraj and the capitalist character of economic order. They wanted
to have a socialist state led by the working class and the peasants. The
Congress party did not treat the Communist party on par with the Hindu Maha
Sabha and the Hindutva. Nehru believed
that the greatest danger to the country was not from the communists but the
people from Hindutva group. Nehru had
the dream of building socialist, democratic and secular country.
The Communist party was a secular party. The Communist party
wanted to abolish capitalism and establish socialism. The idea of socialization
of wealth was staunchly opposed by the capitalist members of the Congress party. The congress party believed that the path for
the development of India should not be the communist path of development. While Mahatma Gandhi ji believed development should
start from the rural Gramin Swaraj. Nehru believed that industrialization is
the only path that will help India to develop and abolish massive poverty that
was found in almost all parts of the country. Nehru was very much influenced by the
socialist ideas of the Soviet Union. He had visited Soviet Union under Stalin
and was interested to introduce socialist path of development in India. He wanted to adopt the ‘five years plans’ for
achieving the development. While believing in socialist path of development
Nehru believed that the capitalist class which has emerged as a strong force in
India was very much essential for the growth and development of the country.
Nehru proposed a mixed economy, Private sector and Public sector. Mixed economy means while there will be the
capitalist class running their private capital. There will also be a strong
role for the state which run the public sector. He had demarcated the areas
where the private sector should not enter into the public sector economy. He
also believed that the public sector should create foundation for the growth of
private sector industry. He believed that infrastructure, roads, railways,
minerals and natural resources should be in the hands of the state.
The Consensus: When
India gained independence the British handed over the power to the
representatives of the people of India.
It was the achievement of the Indian National movement. “It was the one of the best example of the
creation of extremely wide movement with a common aim in which diverse
political and ideological currents could co-exist and work and simultaneously
continue to content for overall ideological and political hegemony. While intense debate on all basic issues was
allowed, the diversity and tension did not weaken the cohesion and striking
power of the movement. On the contrary, this diversity and atmosphere of
freedom and debate became a major source of its strength.”(Bhipan Chandra and
his team)
The consensus under which India stands united was built in the
constitution of India. Every citizen,
every political leader, judiciary, members of bureaucracy, military will adhere
to and protect this constitution. The
parliament is guided by and is protector of the constitution. I think the weakness of our society is that
the tenets of the constitution have not sufficiently percolator down to the
last citizen of the country. This is a
task of all education institutions and actors in the name of the state.