December
6, 2012
The demolition that rebuilt a community
The destruction of Babri Masjid bridged the class divide among
Muslims, giving them a unitary identity and new political awareness
MAZHER HUSSAIN
Defining
moment:Demolition of Babri Masjid in progress on December 6, 1992.— Photo: AFP
Rarely has the destruction of a single building impacted history
as much as the demolition of Babri Masjid. Apart from becoming a watershed in
the history of Indian politics, it has emerged as the defining moment for the
Indian Muslim community — as significant as the partition of India, but while
partition impacted and continues to impact Indian Muslims negatively, the Babri
demolition gave new life and direction to the community.
Intra-community linkages
At partition, most of the Muslim middle class migrated to
Pakistan, leaving a few rich and many poor Muslims behind with little or no
social, educational or cultural interaction between them. The vast majority of
poor Muslims felt orphaned. Coupled with this was the structural exclusion of
the Muslim community from the general domain of development by the
establishment and society at large, restricting access to educational, economic
and development opportunities that reduced the community’s circumstances to a
level below that of Dalits, according to available data. Even the Constitution
of India excludes Muslims from the domain of entitlements by extending
reservations on religious lines — available only to caste Hindus and not to
Muslims or Christians.
But around the phenomenon of demolition of Babri Masjid and the
agitations and violence that preceded, accompanied and followed it, a sense of
commonality, belonging and empathy developed within the Muslim community due to
the shared sense of insecurity and increased profiling irrespective of their
class or location. This resulted in the emergence of a connect between the
elite, the emerging middle class and poor Muslims, leading to increased and
sustained intra-community interaction and collaboration in the social,
educational, economic and political spheres. This in turn led to the
establishment of organisations and institutions at different levels to further
the educational, economic and social development of Muslims in general and of
poor Muslims in particular. So many and so varied avenues for development were
never available to poor Muslims before and most of these were being provided by
rich and middle-class Muslims. Even if this did not greatly improve the situation
of the community, it at least arrested the slide into greater impoverishment.
A new Muslim identity
In the phase before the Babri demolition, most elite and
educated Muslims did not fully identify with the community. The general
perception about a Muslim was that s/he was a poor, illiterate and orthodox
person. Educated and elite Muslims often heard a comment that “you don’t look
like a Muslim, you don’t act like a Muslim” and they felt happy at not being
bracketed with a community perceived as backward. With the dissociation of the
educated and elite Muslims from the community identity, its image suffered even
more, making Muslims easy targets for ridicule and hate, and exclusion from the
spheres of development, entitlements and even claims of equal citizenship.
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Every Muslim — including the elite — started to feel insecure
and realised the injustice of it all. Educated, middle class and elite Muslims
revolted against such profiling and began asserting that yes, they are indeed
Muslims and proud to be so. Atheist Muslims too started accepting their
socio-political Muslim identity even as they rejected faith. Thanks to Hindutva
forces that destroyed the mosque, all Muslims were united as one community with
a single identity. (Post 9/11 and with Islamophobia, this process has started
acquiring international dimensions). The irony was that the Hindutva slogan of
those times “ Garv se kaho hum Hindu hai ” (say with pride I am a Hindu) remained a
slogan, but got Muslims to accept their “Muslimness” and assert it openly.
This broad, all-encompassing “Muslim” identity became the
trigger for numerous initiatives for the development of the community funded
generously by and, and in some cases, with active and sustained participation
of educated and rich Muslims. Not just that, it also resulted in the initiation
of new political processes in the community and the country with far reaching
implications.
Political transformation
With Babri Masjid went too the traditional Muslim leadership
that had made the Babri issue the primary Muslim agenda for almost a decade and
had kept the community confined within the concerns of security. Muslims
started searching for new leaders and new agendas — this time, of justice,
equality and development. As a result, they accepted even non-Muslims like Mulayam
Singh Yadav, Lalu Prasad Yadav and N.T. Rama Rao as leaders.
The Ramjanmabhoomi-Babri Masjid movement and the resultant
formation of the BJP government at the Centre made Muslims realise the
importance of who rules and its impact on the security, identity, culture and
economy of the community. This led to greater political awakening and
participation of Muslims in political processes, ending their earlier
indifference to politics. For all Muslims, politics became a matter of life and
death.
With the community’s greater participation in the electoral
processes, the political influence of Muslims is slightly more than their
numbers because of the increased turn-out and tactical use of the vote. The
Muslim vote has emerged as an important political factor with two objectives:
keeping BJP out and securing rights and entitlements that are due to them as
citizens.
For the first time after independence Muslim concerns entered
the domain of rights and entitlements. It is this awakening of the Muslim
community to their rights as citizens and growing demands for a politics of
entitlement that compelled the Congress government to constitute the Sachar
Committee and that led to the recommendations of the Ranganath Mishra
Commission.
Given all these developments, it would be no exaggeration to say
that demolition of Babri Masjid initiated the reconstruction of a community
that constitutes over 14 per cent of the population and the reorientation of
the political direction of a country.
Tailpiece
Had the domes of Babri remained intact, BJP could have been
still setting the political agenda of the country and ruling the roost while
the Muslim community would have continued to be mired in issues of protection
and security.
Hindutva forces were able to use the domes of Babri Masjid as
images of revulsion to mobilise masses for political gains. But with the domes
destroyed, they seem unable to project the vision of the Grand Ram Temple to
energise enough numbers to propel them to power once again.
Twenty years down the line, it seems moot to ask if the act of
vandalism December 6, 1992 just brought down a Masjid, or has it also
frustrated forever the desire of the Hindutva forces to rule the country.
(Mazher Hussain is Executive Director of COVA, a national
network working on issues of communal harmony in India and peace in South
Asia.)
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Link for friends who may have missed the Panel
Discussion involving Swapan Dasgupta, Yogendra Yadav, Christope and Mazher
Hussain on NDYV 24/7 the Buck Stops Here..
http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/the-buck-stops-here/ayodhya-has-india-moved-beyond...
http://www.ndtv.com/video/player/the-buck-stops-here/ayodhya-has-india-moved-beyond...
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