Dr Muhammad Khan
Under the Modi’s Hindutva ideology,
Indian state is rapidly facing an internal
socio-political and socio-religious fragmentation. This fragmentation is rapidly appearing in the form of domestic unrest throughout India. The domestic unrest becomes more pronounced after Modi’s BJP amended the Indian Constitution to accommodate the illegal migrants, mostly Hindu settlers from neighbouring states (under the garb of persecuted minorities). The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA)-2019, though primarily targeting Muslim population of India, however, it has brought total unrest among the Indian socio-political segment. There are protests across India against this discriminatory law. Thousands of Muslims have been arrested, injured and dozens have been brutally killed by Indian security forces and RSS volunteers.
This unfortunate and fanatic approach of Modi-led BJP has, indeed, pushed India towards a diplomatic isolation. A former Indian top diplomat Mr Shivshankar Menon warned Indian leadership that India is facing international isolation over the religious segregation of its masses, formalized through CAA in December 2019. He said in a recent statement, “Global public opinion on India has shifted if you see the international press. It’s a self-inflicted goal. Cumulative effect of a series of actions, including what happened in Kashmir. We seem to know we are isolated.”
CAA has frightened the Indian Muslims; since it has its linkages with India’s National Register of Citizens (NRC). The NRC is part Indian Government “to identify and weed out people” mainly Muslims from all over India, starting from Assam, where 1.9 million people have already been declared non-Indian. This will be implemented all over India in the form of CAA. The Indian masses are protesting against this amendment and NRC on three logical bases:-
One, it is against the essence of Indian Constitution. The Indian Constitution grants citizenship to all Indians without any religious discrimination. As per the legal experts, CAA is a contradiction to the basic principles of Indian Constitution. CAA is violation of Article 14 of the Indian Constitution, which guarantees the right to equality, thus religion cannot be made as the basis of citizenship of India. The Indian legal experts say, “Our Constitution prohibits any discrimination based on religion. By distinguishing illegal immigrants based on religion, CAA violates the basic structure of the Indian constitution.” The legal fraternity of India declare it as extra-terrestrial and unusual development like transplanting Indian Constitution.
Two, CAA is purely directed against Muslims, not other minorities. The Indian Muslims fear that after imposition of CAA, Indian Government may expel them from India in any subsequent phase. This is evident from the statement of Amit Shah, the Indian Home Minister, who clearly said, “Whoever is not eligible to be included in the NRC will be sent out of the country.” Besides, the ruthless reaction of Indian security forces, which is purely directed against Muslims. In UP, the police officers while beating the Muslims have been asking Muslim victims to leave India and go to Pakistan. Besides, after the barbaric violence against students of Aligarh Muslim University and Jamia Millia Islamia University, the university administration told students that, if you file any official complaint against police, you will be expelled from university and “charged under the national security act.”
Three, CAA is, indeed, an outcome of the Hindutva ideology of BJP and RSS. Over the past few decades, Hindutva ideology has slowly and gradually ingressed a huge segment of upper class Hindus of India and poised the Indian society with hate culture towards all minorities. Though, currently this hate culture is centred against the Muslims, however, subsequently it will target other minorities, since the agenda is converting India as Hindu state under the ideology of Hindutva. Hindutva is Hindu nationalism, coined and nurtured by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar in 1923 and championed by RSS, Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Hindu Sena. The impartial scholars call this as a fascist outfit like Nazi regime of Hitler and Fascist regime of Mussolini, adhering to a concept of homogenised majority and cultural hegemony. Hindutva ideology has lot of resemblance with the Zionist ideology of the Israeli State, which has unleashed a reign of terror in the Middle East against Palestinians.
Kapil Komireddi wrote a very insightful article about the real motives behind abrogation of Article 370 in Indian occupied Kashmir by Indian Government. Entitled as, “The Kashmir crisis isn’t about territory. It’s about a Hindu victory over Islam”. With the slogan of democracy dies in the darkness, the prestigious American daily, ‘The Washington Post’ published this article with many insightful revelations.
Professor Kate Sullivan de Estrada, Director of South Asian Studies in University of Oxford has very keenly observed the political and social developments in India over the years. Seeing the mass mobilization of Indian masses against CAA, the author is of the opinion that, “Modi’s ‘Hindutva face” is just like ‘failed transplant’, hence rejected by majority of Indian population. Despite countrywide protests against CAA, Indian Prime Minister and Home Minister Amit Shah have reiterated that ‘Indian government would not budge an inch on Citizenship Amendment Act. With such a Hindu centred Hindutva ideology, India is being isolated rapidly at the global level. This isolation would deprive India of an attractive state for the investment by civilized world.
— The writer, a retired Brig, is Professor of Politics and International Relations at International Islamic University, Islamabad.
