Whatever happened to the Constitution, Mr CM?

Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai must be considered a towering intellect compared to many ministers and chief ministers belonging to his party who are not just lacking in education but make a brazen show of it each time they open their mouths. Bommai, after all, grew up in the intellectual milieu of his father S R Bommai, Ramakrishna Hegde, J H Patel and others of the Janata Parivar, broadly aligned with the ‘Left of Centre’ ideology and apparently the radical humanism of M N Roy. Trained as an engineer and exposed to this intellectual upbringing, Bommai should be able to analyse social phenomena with a ‘humanist’ and ‘progressive’ approach and give them ‘rational’ explanations.

How such a mind can accept the illogic and unreason of his current ideological home, Hindutva, a toxic religiosity used for political purposes,is an unresolved puzzle. But such ideological compromises produce some bizarre formulations, as Bommai has demonstrated.

Recently, while defending the vigilante forces of Dakshina Kannada district, Bommai came up with a strange explanation that moral policing occurs “when moral values in society diminish.” What he said, in effect, was that the goon squads of Mangaluru and Dakshina Kannada threatening and assaulting the local youth are, in his view, the guardians of our morality, and that their victims were lacking in “morality” and deserved to be censured, threatened or beaten up. That formulation reflects a rather disturbing mindset.

To put the Chief Minister’s statement in context, it must be noted that “in recent days, Dakshina Kannada district has seen several cases of young people belonging to different faiths, travelling together or socialising, being confronted, threatened or attacked by right-wing activists” as one newspaper reported on October 14.

To that, Bommai said that these incidents were to be seen through the prism of “action and reaction”. He argued that “moral values are needed in society” and that it is “improper for young people to act in a way that affects social values.”

The “action” in this case was boys and girls of different faiths travelling together or socialising, which is certainly not an offence under any law. And the “reaction” was threats and attacks by right-wing activists. That clearly is an offence, and the vigilantes should have been booked under any of the sections of IPC ranging from Sections 319 to 324 or 504, 506 and 509. Instead, they are being extolled by the Chief Minister as ‘Dharma Rakshaks’, like the ‘Gau Rakshaks’ in Uttar Pradesh who go around lynching Muslims.

Firstly, since when did the government or a political party or its goons become the custodians of our morals? When we vote a party to power, we certainly do not grant them the power to legislate on who our daughters should marry or who our children should fraternise with, do we? Such encroachments into our personal and social lives can only be seen in totalitarian systems. As far as I know, we are not yet in a totalitarian system and those we have elected to govern us have to do so in a constitutional democracy wherein “We, the people… have solemnly resolved to secure to ourselves Justice, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” as the foundational principles on which the accountability of all governance rests. This lofty ideal – ‘Fraternity, assuring the dignity of the individual and (unity and integrity of the nation)’ was inserted at the insistence of Babasaheb Ambedkar precisely to prevent the division and polarisation of our society on religious and caste lines. It’s a sad turn that those who have taken the oath of office to “bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of India” are working to wreck it.

Secondly, how has the government determined that our “moral values” have diminished or are diminishing? From what standards have they fallen and who sets those standards? Thirdly, has the government outsourced the task of upholding our “moral values” to a bunch of vigilantes? And what exactly are they upholding -- Manu Smriti and unquestioned patriarchy that subjugates women?

The vigilantes must have been put behind bars. Instead, a BJP MLA goes to the police station and receives them on their release, just as Jayant Sinha, a former Union minister went and garlanded eight persons convicted of lynching a Muslim man to death when they were released on bail in Hazaribagh in July 2018. Are our elected representatives being directed by some authority other than their oath to uphold the Constitution to go and express solidarity with self-appointed custodians of our “moral values”?

Apparently, members of the Sangh Parivar believe that they are the chosen ones to protect our “Dharma”. And the RSS Sarsanghachalak Mohan Bhagwat seems to think this is the moment for them to fulfill their “mission”. The very confused man goes about one day exhorting Muslims to integrate into the larger Hindu community “as their DNA is the same” and on another day rages against Muslims whose population, according to him, is outgrowing Hindu population, or exhorting Hindu girls not to defy their patriarchal diktat in marrying outside their religion. Not only are these men now above the law but they are shaping the law of the land – the ‘Love Jihad’ laws in many BJP states, for instance.

As if to assure the Sarsanghachalak, the Chief Minister has reiterated that “a law against religious conversion in Karnataka is being contemplated and will be framed soon.” He is, no doubt, looking to the example set by his counterpart in UP, Yogi Adityanath. Here Bommai will do well to remember that voters in Karnataka did not take warmly to the election campaigns of Amit Shah and Yogi Adityanath and that probably was one of the factors for BS Yediyurappa’s failure to win a majority in 2018.

Note also, Chief Minister, that this is a land ruled by both the Wadiyars and Tipu Sultan; shaped by the philosophy of both Basavanna and Shishunala Sharifa.

Let not Nagpur, Lucknow or the Gujarat model guide our policymaking here in Karnataka. They have nothing to offer except a toxic brand of religious polarisation. Let us be true to our own history, culture and genius. Let the Constitution be our guide.

(The writer is a former Cabinet Secretariat official)