[Originally written on 31 October 2006; updated in 2012]
A series of reports have been published in Indian Express with regard to the findings of the Justice Rajinder Sachar Committee on the aspect of status of Muslim community in India. It is reported that in sharp contrast to education and employment, where their share is way, way below their share of the population, Muslims have a disproportionately high representation when it comes to being in prison.
One has to view the findings of this Committee with a pinch of salt. The very purpose of setting up the Justice Rajinder Sachar Committee was to further divide the Indian society for narrow political gains, by preparing ground for appeasement of a particular section of the society. The basic question is when any competitive examination or any academic examination (such as the UPSC examinations, or for that matter, most of the other competitive examinations, as well as almost all SSC, HSC, College examinations, etc.) are held, do the answer sheets contain the details of the name and community of the student or candidate concerned? Sorry, they merely contain some innocuous roll number or nowadays some secret code number. Let us not consider the interviews here, for the time being, as there can be some difference of opinion there regarding the question of objectivity as the name and other details of the candidate are known to the Interview Board; but in any case the interviews carry much less weightage than the written examination (supposed to be less than 15% of the total marks, as held by the Supreme Court in the case of Ajay Hasia v. Khalid Mujib Sehravardi, (1981) 1 SCC 722 : AIR 1981 SC 487 : (1981) 2 SCR 79). In such a case, how can there be even a question of a systematic effort to leave out any particular community from education or services? If people belonging to a particular community are not able to compete with others, then why blame others for that? There are various other reasons for such a situation as is apparently depicted in the Sachar Committee report. The main blame should go to the particular community itself.
It is pertinent to mention here about an interesting article “What went wrong?” by Dr. Farrukh Saleem published in the Pakistan’s leading “Jung” newspaper on 8 November, 2005 [original link was here, but it is not available now; instead, read a copy of this article here]. Some relevant extracts are reproduced below:
“The combined annual GDP of 57 Muslim countries remains under $2 trillion. America, just by herself, produces goods and services worth $10.4 trillion; China $5.7 trillion, Japan $3.5 trillion and Germany $2.1 trillion. Even India’s GDP is estimated at over $3 trillion (purchasing power parity basis). Oil rich Saudi Arabia, U.A.E., Kuwait and Qatar collectively produce goods and services (mostly oil) worth $430 billion; Netherlands alone has a higher annual GDP while Buddhist Thailand produces goods and services worth $429 billion. … Conclusion: Muslims of the world are among the poorest of the poor. … Fifty-seven Muslim majority countries have an average of ten universities each for a total of less than 600 universities for 1.4 billion people; India has 8,407 universities, the U.S. has 5,758. … Fact: Of the 1.4 billion Muslims 800 million are illiterate (6 out of 10 Muslims cannot read). … What really went wrong? Muslims are poor, illiterate and weak. What went wrong? Arriving at the right diagnosis is extremely critical because the prescription depends on it. Consider this: Diagnosis 1: Muslims are poor, illiterate and weak because they have ‘abandoned the divine heritage of Islam’. Prescription: We must return to our real or imagined past. Diagnosis 2: Muslims are poor, illiterate and weak because we have refused to change with time. Keep pace with time — al Quran.”
It is thus clear that it is not just in India, it is all over the world that Muslim community is lagging behind other communities. Who should be blamed for that? The secular Indian state?
One has to be on the side of caution at the efforts of certain political groups who are bent upon to again divide the society to continue their rule. One’s only worry is that irrespective of whether or not the Muslim community gains by such an effort, it has the potential of polarising the society further which may ultimately (and unfortunately) prove to be more harmful to the Muslim community itself. Yes, the only sure gainers would be the politicians of both sides – one who divide the society like this, and the other who oppose it and thereby benefit from the resultant polarisation of the society.
In the wake of the aforesaid findings of the Sachar Committee, there are suggestions that the secular Indian state should do something about this dismal state of affairs of the Muslim community in India and intervene in the matter.
Unfortunately, these are the very arguments which are used by the so-called “progressives” at the initial stage of launching any new “divide and rule” policy. Start with a Committee, come out with a Report with some “convenient” numbers, build up some sort of justification for interference by the state invoking some supposedly high philosophical ground, ignite the passions of the “affected” section of the society, encourage high-pitched demands from such section of the society (and if there are protests from the other sections of the society, it may even be of further help to the sponsoring political group as it will further help to deepen the polarisation), and then slowly and slowly keep on adding more and more structures on the foundations so laid! How familiar it sounds and how many more times such processes would be repeated to divide the Indian society further and further?
Yes, one may not have a fight with the numbers. Even before the findings of this Committee came out in public domain, it was well known that the Muslim community is lagging behind in many fields (and, as pointed out above, this community is lagging behind not only in India but in the world as a whole in spite of its Petro dollars). Nor can one have any objection if sincere and genuine efforts are made in a non-partisan manner to ameliorate the situation. The objection is only with the “object”, or rather the “hidden object” behind setting up such a Committee for the narrow political gains.
By the way, in how many fields has the Indian state intervention been successful till date? Could the Indian state improve the lot of the SCs or STs in last about six decades? In fact, if we go by the trend of increasing reservations for more and more “backward” classes, one gets the impression that India has become more backward in last six decades since now more backward communities are entitled for reservations! So, which state intervention we are talking about? On the other hand, we have evidence (such as in the IT sector) where the absence of state intervention made the sector prosper. Perhaps the time has come to say that most of the progress made in India is “in spite of” the state and not “because of the state”. It is the people of India who have been striving to make it prosper in spite of so many hindrances put up by the state in the form of a plethora of rules, regulations, faulty policies, licence permit raj, and the like.
Of course, do encourage education at primary, secondary as well as higher levels, but for all. In fact, one can even go to the extent of saying that all children should be compulsorily enrolled at state cost at least up to the secondary level education, irrespective of their religion, with emphasis on teaching modern science and other latest developments, instead of concentrating on religious schools or religious education; and in fact, any parent(s) withdrawing his/her child(ren) from schools should be punished under law. One does not know why the state has failed to implement the provisions of fundamental right to education under the amended Article 21A of the Constitution for last several years now. [Update: The Right to Education Act, 2009, has since been enacted and implemented, however, like most other statutes, it is more on paper than in practice.]
The point here is – nobody will or can have an objection if such universal efforts are made such as implementing right to education for “all” but no more sectarian approach please.
Moreover, let all other positive measures, such as financial help, be taken up, and not only for a particular section of the society but for all needy sections on secular or non-partisan basis.
At the same time, intensive efforts are required from within the Muslim community itself as well. Unfortunately, the reality points in some other direction. Look at a measure so innocuous as polio vaccines and there is resistance, thereby allowing the deadly disease to start spreading its wings again!
But, no further divide and rule policies please. Unfortunately, the reality and the past experience point in this direction only while an average hapless Indian can only keep hoping against the hope.
[Also see: The Missing Muslim – Part 2]
