Amartya, Ajmal and Arvind: The widening gap between liberal intellectuals and secular politicians

That secular politicians are open to respecting Hindu beliefs or unwilling to fall into the Hindutva binary is bad news for the BJP

Politicians can sometimes be slow to understand the realities of a changing world, particularly when their world transforms drastically and rapidly. It happened to the secular-liberal politicians of India in the present century, when they slowly but steadily faded out of the national political arena as they lost to the worldview of Hindu nationalism.

But, it seems, finally, at least some of the ilk have learnt their lessons, even if the hard way. Recently, in a media house programme, Amartya Sen urged the people of the country to come out and honour Umar Khalid (who is facing charges of subversion and put under arrest under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act). For, Sen believes Khalid is cultivating "bold political thoughts". Even a couple of years ago, such statements from a leading secular liberal intellectual would have encouraged many political leaders of the secular-liberal camp to echo the sentiment. But none dared to on this occasion.

Take also, for example, the recent controversy around Trinamool Congress Lok Sabha MP Mahua Moitra's statements on Goddess Kali. Notably, even her party, the TMC, distanced itself from Moitra's comments. The evidence would suggest that the secular liberal parties are undergoing a course correction.

Some leaders have changed their positioning to honour the feelings of the Hindus. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief and the chief minister of Delhi, Arvind Kejriwal, course-corrected a couple of years back. The latest example is Badruddin Ajmal, the top Muslim leader of Assam, a state that has a 35 per cent Muslim population. Recently, Ajmal urged the Muslims of Assam not to slaughter cows on Eid. "When our brothers in the country profess the Sanatan faith and are Hindus, who worship the cow and consider it their mother, why should we sacrifice the animal?" Ajmal told the media.

Ajmal heads the minority-based political entity, the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF), which has a strong base in Assam's Muslim-dominated areas. In the 2021 Assembly polls in Assam, Ajmal's party contested as a part of the Congress-led mahajot (grand alliance) for the first time. It secured 16 seats out of the 20 it contested. Of the rest 106 (of Assam's total 126-seats), the mahajot could win only 34. Therefore, the appeal from Ajmal, an Islamic theologian and head of the Jamiat Ulama-e-Hind for Assam, is significant. But it is not something novel.

Nationalist Muslim leaders like Maulana Mohammad Ali, Shaukat Ali, Hakim Ajmal Khan, Maulana Hussain Ahmad Madani and others conceived the idea of Muslims refraining from cow slaughter in 1919. These leaders were active in the Mahatma Gandhi-led Khilafat Movement. Khwaja Hasan Nizami, a scholarly Sufi leader, penned a book, Tark-e Ga'o Kushi, or refraining from cow slaughter, in 1921, on the subject.

Ironically, almost all the 20 states that have enacted laws to ban cow slaughter did so during the Congress governments in these states, mainly in the 1950s and 1960s. But then it all changed. The 'sensitivity' for the 'Hindu' was lost altogether. The Congress-led secular narrative, aided by the liberal intellectuals (who dominated the media, too), paid scant attention to the great exodus of Hindus from Kashmir under duress. In later years, it turned extreme, particularly from the beginning of the present century. When more than 60 Hindus were burnt alive in a train compartment in Godhra in Gujarat in 2002, the 'liberal secular' intelligentsia and political leadership observed a puzzling silence.

This marriage between radical secular-liberal intellectuals and political parties had a free run from the post-PV Narasimha Rao days to at least until 2019. However, after Narendra Modi's second consecutive win in the national polls with an absolute majority, it was quite evident that the country had changed: the BJP had replaced the once-dominant Congress, which last secured an absolute majority in 1984.

So, either under duress or as a calculated political move, the secular-liberal politicians and parties have finally started distancing themselves from the ultra-radical intellectuals like Amartya Sen and also from their own colleagues, such as Mahua Moitra. The developments clearly show that secular politicians are coming to terms with the new reality of India, which is characterised by the aspirations and assertions of the Hindus.

It is a welcome move, no doubt. While the secular parties becoming appreciative of the feelings of Hindus may curb the space of free speech as far as religious sentiments of all the communities are concerned, in the political space, it will limit the scope of the BJP following religion-based politics, for this politics cannot survive unless challenged by political opponents. After all, it was Lal Krishna Advani's Ram temple versus all others' opposition to it that laid the first stones for the ultimate victory of Hindu nationalism.

Without such challenges to it, religious appeals become much less appealing politically. If the secular parties do not give the BJP further scope of reaping benefits by mixing religion with politics or playing jingoistic, in future, the Hindu nationalists, too, will be left with no other option than limiting them to secular issues concerning the creation of a new, assertive and proud India.

(Diptendra Raychaudhuri is a journalist and author based in Kolkata)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.