Pursuits: The singing of Vande Mataram is not compulsory

Who would have thought that a song could provoke so much anger?

And yet, here we are, many weeks after the Vande Mataram controversy started up again, still going over the same issues and still many miles from a resolution.

 

   The controversy over Vande Mataram is not new. When it was first proposed that it should be made the national song many secular Hindus objected. They pointed out that some of its verses referred to Hindu goddesses and that non-Hindus might find it difficult to sing a song with an obvious Hindu agenda.

 

   In those relatively more sensible times, the founders of our nation recognized that the objections were valid. Why should Muslims or Christians be made to sing a song that venerated Hindu goddesses?

 

   A solution was reached. The offending verses were excised. And many Muslims – including Maulana Azad – declared that there was nothing at all objectionable about the bowdlerized version of the song.

 

   The matter should have ended there.

 

   But of course it didn’t. Periodically, some Muslim organization or the other rakes up the issue and says that the song contains a reference to bowing down before Mother India. Muslims are forbidden by the Koran from bowing down before anyone other than Allah. So, good Muslims cannot be expected to sing the song.

 

   I have several problems with this view. The chief problem is that it portrays Muslims in terms that Hindu communalists love: as people who do not believe in bowing down before Mother India but owe loyalty to some pan-national religion. This proves, say the communalists, that Muslims are Muslims first and Indians second. Once you accept that then all the other allegations hurled against Muslims (they have extra-national loyalties, they like Pakistan, etc.) suddenly seem more credible.

 

   Nevertheless, as somebody who believes in freedom of religion, my position is simple: if some Muslims find the song objectionable then they shouldn’t sing it. In a secular country, there should be no question of forcing people to go against deeply-held religious beliefs.

 

   My position happens to be the position of the Indian state. The singing of Vande Mataram is not compulsory. It is not the national anthem. No Muslim has to sing it if he doesn’t want to.

 

   Fair enough?

 

   I would think so. And that should be that.

 

   Alas, when it comes to Muslim politics in India, nothing is ever that simple. The Vande Mataram controversy has come up again and again. And nearly always, it is Muslim leaders who have raised the issue.

 

   Two decades ago, Muslims turned a refusal to sing Vande Mataram into a bogus emotive issue in Bombay. Hindu communalists responded in the usual way: this proves they have no love for Mother India, etc. etc.

 

   Eventually, a municipal election was fought on the issue. By then, a communal divide had grown up over the issue. Muslims refused to vote for the Congress because ‘Islam was in danger’ and many moderate Hindus were so angered by the controversy that they voted for the Shiv Sena. Predictably, the Shiv Sena got in and treated this as one more stop on the road to legitimacy.

 

   The current episode of the Vande Mataram saga has come about because of the Deobandi fatwa against singing the song. You may well ask: why was it necessary for the Muslim clergy to get involved? Nobody is forcing Muslims to sing Vande Mataram. Why make an issue out of nothing?

 

"The Vande Mataram issue demonstrates that as long as political correctness silences the majority, the fundamentalists will play havoc with the future of Muslims and of India itself."

   Why indeed?

 

   There is only one answer and it is not a pretty one.

 

   The sad reality is that Muslims in India are ill-served by many of their leaders. Having failed to improve the lot of their community – Muslims remain poorer, less educated and more discriminated against – they seek succor in emotive religious issues.

 

   That’s why a fuss is being created over Vande Mataram. That’s why Indian Muslims are expected to get agitated about Danish cartoons. That’s why a bogus unity is sought to be forged between Indian Muslims and the Muslims of the Middle-east against America, the Great Satan.

 

   All of these issues are humbug. They have nothing to do with the condition of Indian Muslims. But Muslim leaders revel in raising them.

 

   When Hindu leaders raise religious issues, the Hindu majority attacks them for living in the medieval ages. Few of us care whether a Ram temple is built in Ayodhya or not. We really don’t give a damn about alleged insults to Hinduism. We know which issues matter and which ones do not.

 

   Sadly, Muslim leaders benefit from two factors. The first is the lack of education in their own community which allows them to evade the real issues and to create furors on religious matters. The second is our notion of secular political correctness. Liberal Hindus will condemn Hindu militancy and fundamentalism. But we will tread softly when it comes to Muslim extremism.

 

   We think we are doing a Muslim community a favour by being gentle. In fact, we are doing exactly the opposite. By insisting on genuine secularism within the Hindu community and by turning a blind eye to religious fundamentalism among Muslims, we are implicitly accepting that Muslims are a fanatical people who must be allowed to enjoy a degree of religious extremism.

 

   In the process, we are weakening Indian secularism.

 

   The truth is that all extremism in the name of religion is bad. India can only survive if we condemn all fundamentalism.  And the Vande Mataram issue demonstrates that as long as political correctness silences the majority, the fundamentalists will play havoc with the future of Muslims and of India itself.