Muslims as a political community

HILAL AHMED

THE sharp decline in the number of Muslim MPs in the 15th Lok Sabha has given a new impetus to the conventional debate on Muslim political representation.¹ Although the debate is still dominated by the legal-constitutionalists, who focus on the proportional correlation between the total Muslim population and the number of Muslim MPs and MLAs as the only possible technique to assess Muslim political participation, the post-Sachar report political developments have expanded the scope of this discussion in significant ways.² 

For example, the Dalit Muslim/Pasmanda Muslim politics, which was initially characterised either as a part of Hindutva’s strategy to break Muslim unity, or as a misleading intellectual conspiracy to activate new conflicts among Muslims, has now been accommodated in larger Muslim political demands.³ Similarly, the conventional Muslim concerns, which primarily revolve around the protection of Muslim identity – Aligarh, Urdu, personal laws and Babri Masjid – are gradually being replaced by the emerging issues of greater participation in public life, development, and internal democratization.

These new themes of contemporary Indian Muslim politics clearly show that the question of Muslim political representation is no longer confined to the number of Muslim MPs. On the contrary, this under-representation, or what is also called Muslim political deprivation, reintroduces us to two fundamental questions: (a) Do Indian Muslims constitute a political community? (b) Is the notion of political representation linked to the Muslim politics of social justice in contemporary India, especially in the post-Sachar Committee political scenario?

This paper approaches the notion of Muslim-ness and the conceptual package called Muslim issues from the point of view of contemporary Muslim politicians, who actually practice these ideas to deal with the political engagements of Indian Muslim communities. It brings together the political ideas of four Muslim politicians – Syed Shahabuddin, Shahid Siddiqui, Ali Anwar Ansari, and Asaduddin Owaisi. These four politicians are selected primarily for two reasons. First, these individuals represent four different political perspectives – Shahabuddin is a legal-constitutionalist, Shahid Siddiqui takes a liberal-modernist position, Ali Anwar Ansari is a radical Dalit Muslim/Pasmanda leader, while Asaduddin Owaisi is concerned with community empowerment and development. These four perspectives underline the multiplicity of Indian Muslim politics and introduce us to an exciting debate on Muslim political identity and social justice.

The intellectual involvement of these politicians also makes their ideas more significant. Syed Shahabuddin is the editor of an English journal, Muslim India, which has been an important source of documentation on Muslim issues since 1983. Shahid Siddiqui is the editor of a widely circulated Urdu weekly, Nai Duniya. Ali Anwar Ansari is the editor of a Hindi journal, Pasmanda Awaaz. He has also written a path-breaking book on caste problems among the Muslims of Bihar, Masawat ki Jung (Battle for Equality). Asaduddin Owaisi is a lawyer by profession and involved in an educational trust called the Dar-Us-Salam Trust and Education Board.

The paper is entirely based on personal interviews with these four politicians. It makes a modest attempt to study Muslim political ideas as a possible vantage point to explore the larger debates on affirmative action and political representation in India. It is hoped that this kind of enquiry will help us move beyond the established dividing line between communalism and secularism and initiate a fresh discussion on contemporary Muslim political identity.

 

Syed Shahabuddin⁴ 

Muslims as a political community: I use the term community in a communitarian sense. …In my opinion, society has to recognize the interests of all communities without insisting that communities get assimilated into any given identity. The distinctive identities of communities should not be juxtaposed with the social, political and economic rights given to the citizens… You have your community identity, at the same time you have your rights as a citizen. If social goods are distributed in terms of religion and Muslims are not given their due share, their demands convert them into a political community. …However, it does not mean that there is no demand of equal share within the Muslim society. Muslim backward groups are demanding that they should be given their due share. …In fact, the rise of Dalits and Muslim backwards shows that political identity is not fixed – rather it is contextual, varies from time to time, evolves and takes various shapes, according to the changing socio-political context. So, the logic is: Once you become conscious of your identity and you have certain numbers, in my opinion, you constitute a political community. …This is an all India trend and those groups, which were usually submerged in the larger groups such Hindus/Muslims/OBC/SC/ST are now coming up. I see the rise of Muslim sub-groups in this context.

My position on Muslim reservation is also linked to the idea of political community. Muslims should be given reservation because it is legally and constitutionally possible and morally and socially justifiable. I demand that the Muslim community should have a separate sub-quota as a backward class, in proportion to its national/state population and its relative backwardness as determined on the basis of uniform prescribed parameters. …The Muslim sub-communities, which are on par with SCs, and which have in some states been included in the OBC lists, should be admitted to the SC list.

 

On political representation and social justice: Politics is a means to achieve social justice. …Muslim unity is something which is needed to influence the electoral system of the country in such a way that the Muslims can secure their equitable share. …Muslim unity, particularly political unity, is often seen in a national perspective. It is said that Muslims must unite at the national level and vote for a particular political party. …In the context of coalition governments, voting for one political party is neither feasible nor desirable. Similarly, the idea of Muslim unity at state level is also quite problematic because there are hardly eight or nine states where Muslims are in a decisive position to influence any particular party… We have to recognize the fact that Muslim unity plays an important role at the constituency level. So, Muslims must unite at the constituency level and vote for a candidate of their choice. …This will help us understand the possibilities and limits of this idea of Muslim unity. …We have to recognize political diversity at various levels to think of a Muslim unity which could help Muslims to secure their national as well as local interests.

I think Muslims need a Muslim core party in the present context and a reservation system. These two must go together. A Muslim core party should be a secular party, not a communal one. It should not confine itself to address only the grievances of Muslims; rather, it should deal with all national questions – the federal question, decentralization of power and so on. This core political party with a secular outlook and wider national horizon will work for the Muslim community purely on a political basis.

There is a basic difference between the commonly proposed Muslim party and the Muslim core party. This core party will be exactly like other core parties which have emerged in recent times. For example RJD and SP are core Yadav parties while BSP is a core party of a particular Dalit caste in UP. …The second half of this proposition is that in the present electoral system, there is political reservation for SC and ST, but neither for OBCs nor for religious minorities. I think that the representation question will not be resolved merely by floating a Muslim core party. Possibly, reservation of seats in the legislative bodies is also needed.

If we look at our electoral system, we find that an elected representative simply does not represent the entire population. …In this scenario we need a system in which every vote counts. Therefore, some kind of structural changes are desperately needed. In my opinion, we have to think of a proportional representation system (PRS).

It is often said that PRS will encourage communalism. This is not the case. The PRS will not give birth to new Muslim voters. Rather, the existing Muslim voters will have a new system and more options. …One has to rethink the larger issues and an attempt should be made to restructure our institutions in such a way that they could be made more responsive and representative…We must have a serious debate on the electoral system and possibility of some kind of structural charges.

 

Shahid Siddiqui⁵

Muslims as a political community: One who believes in Allah and the Prophet Muhammad and recites the Kalima is by definition a Muslim. But in a broader political sense, this is a complex identity formation. There are those Muslims who recognize themselves as part of a larger Muslim community or Umma in India; at the same time there are Muslims who do not feel so. We must remember that every political identity in India is recognized in term of its social grouping, based mainly on caste-like structures. In this sense, Muslim political identity too has emerged like a caste group identity in post-1950 India… Islam, which is a unifying religious identity of Muslims, does not destroy other regional, social and cultural identities. In fact, the caste system is an important sociological feature of Indian Islam, which actually plays an important role in the formation of political identities of Muslim communities.

There is no Hindu or Muslim vote bank in India precisely became one cannot define social groups in closed religious categories. A Muslim vote bank kind of argument is based on an assumption that there is only one Muslim community, which always votes for a selected political party. This myth of a single Muslim political identity was first created by the British and later advanced by the Muslim League. Interestingly, the secularists have also endorsed this myth to secure their own vested interests. So, it is very difficult to define a Muslim political identity. In my opinion, it depends on the ways in which it is seen.

 

On political representation and social justice: I think that there is a need to work on the socio-economic unity of Muslims in India. We do not need any Muslim political party to achieve the objective of unity. Instead, Muslims should be united to create a broader pressure group, which could struggle for the social-economic and cultural rights of Muslim in India. This pressure group has also to fight for strengthening the democratic secular system in India. Muslims have to understand that their demands should be based on three pillars – secularism, democracy and nationalism. Secularism will transform Muslim demands into larger social political issues, democracy would ensure legal constitutional validity of these demands and finally, nationalism – not a Hindutva type nationalism but the nationalism of people which represents the collective interests of all Indians – will make these demands more acceptable… The idea to have a Muslim political party is still questionable. But a platform of a non-political type could be a possible step to make collective Muslim demands more relevant. Such a non-political entity should work with all other secular forces to deal with the socio-political demands of all the deprived sections of Indian society.

The question of Muslim political representation should be seen in a proper perspective. It is easy to talk about fundamental changes in constitutional arrangements in order to achieve electoral representation of Muslims. But the real question is: Will it help the Muslim community? In my opinion, Muslim representation is also linked to the nature of Muslim leadership. If secular-educated Muslims, who have a mass base and are not hand-picked by the secular parties, lead the Muslims in all spheres of life, the community would definitely benefit. Unfortunately, our political parties do not encourage such leaders. They want to pick up only those Muslims who simply adhere to their policies and do not raise the real issues. This has become a political norm of our system. Since there are few educated secular leaders at local levels, it becomes easier for political parties to select favourable Muslims.

The proportional representation system is going to be counter-productive for Muslims. It is important for Muslim groups to create functional political coalitions to secure their political interests within the broader scheme of existing political systems governed by our Constitution… Muslims have to do some kind of social engineering. In fact, Muslims have seen some experiments in the past. The Dalit-Muslim unity under the Congress was the first such experiment. It was followed by the OBC-Muslim unity experiment in post-Mandal India. This experiment in my opinion failed because Yadavs and Jats, especially in UP, did not support the Muslims in political terms. The third option, the current Dalit-Muslim unity, is something which might be helpful for both social groups. Dalits and Muslims are both exploited by upper caste Hindu forces and their unity is politically desirable, though it did not work in the recent elections.

The question of representation should also be seen in the context of justice and injustice. This goes beyond the question of reservations. An equal distribution of public goods should be the first principle of justice. To achieve this objective one has to recognize the fact that our society is highly diversified. There are various social groups which have so far been excluded, among them Muslims. So, all the welfare and public schemes must be implemented in such a way that the benefits should reach the excluded social groups. …There should be a system based on the principle of rule of law. Every community should be treated equally. The Equal Opportunity Commission in my opinion is a possible way out to deal with these issues. I am glad that the Sachar Committee has made a recommendation in this regard.

 

Ali Anwar Ansari⁶

Muslims as a political community: The Muslim community is not a homogeneous community. Muslims are divided on caste and class lines. In fact, they are very conscious of their specific caste/tribal identities. For that reason, their interests and issues are different from each other… We must remember that social stratification is a natural phenomenon. The Arab society was also socially divided at the time of Prophet Muhammad. However, Islam did not ignore these realities and Muslims were encouraged to give up social hierarchies of all kinds. The Prophet of Islam in his last sermon called upon all the Muslims to establish a society based on social justice. We must, therefore, recognize that social stratification among Muslims is a social reality.

It is often argued, particularly by the forward Muslims, that India was ruled by Muslims for nearly 700 years. The question is who were the Muslim rulers? Was India ruled by the common Muslims? All the Muslim kings and nawabs were upper caste Muslims – Shaikhs, Syeds, Mughals and Pathans. The majority of Muslims, mainly those local biradaris (communities) who embraced Islam, were not at all related to these Muslim rulers. The Muslim society is divided on caste lines – Ashraf, Ajlaf and Arzal. …This social categorization based on social prestige actually established a kind of unjust Muslim social order. It was ironic because Islamic principles do not approve of such social divisions. The majority of the people who got converted to Islam were lower caste Hindus, who found a new hope in Islam. But the caste system did not allow them that space even in the Islamic fold. …It is true that these inferior Muslims were allowed to practice Islamic religious customs, offering namaz and observing roza, but the social and cultural practices evolved in such a way that these Muslim social groups became the lower castes or Pasmandas forever.

The word Pasmanda is a Persian word, which means deprived. I use it to describe the backward Muslims simply because this word captures the essence of the concept of social backwardness. Since the Muslim caste structure is quite similar to the Hindus, I use Pasmanda and Dalit Muslims interchangeably. …Pasmanda means a class not caste of people. It is a larger social category, which includes all marginalized castes, groups and tribes. …the economically backward Muslim upper castes might also be called Pasmanda. However, they are outside the fold of the existing reservation system. Thus, Muslims are equal in religious terms (though in a limited manner because lower caste Muslims are discriminated against even in mosques and graveyards), but socially, culturally and politically there is no single Muslim community in India.

An imaginary Muslim homogeneity has dominated the political discourse in colonial and post-colonial India. The Ashraf Muslim leadership did not bother to raise the issues of Muslim Dalits. As a result, the Muslim Dalits could not be included in the SC list. …The Mandal Commission for the first time recognized the position of lower caste Muslims and recommended that they should be included in the OBC category. The Ashraf leadership, however, has been trying to capture the benefits of Mandal Commission by demanding that all Muslims be recognized as OBC.

 

On political representation and social justice: I do not think that the proportional representation system will help Muslims. It will only increase communalism and strengthen the Hindutva forces. In my opinion the question of political representation should be seen at three levels. At the first level we must have reservation in jobs and educational institutions for Muslim Dalits and OBCs. This will enhance the political consciousness of Pasmanda groups and pave the way for a new educated Pasmanda leadership in the future.

At the second level, I demand that Muslim Dalits should be included in the SC list. …The inclusion of the Muslim and Christian Dalits into the SC list is justifiable because the Sikhs and the neo-Buddhists were given SC status after the infamous Presidential Order of 1950. This will provide an opportunity to Dalit Muslims to elect their own representatives. Consequently, the legislative bodies will also become more representative. However, the inclusion of Muslim Dalits in the SC list will not affect the rights of Muslims to elect a non-Muslim or non-Dalit Muslim representative. Muslims living in general constituencies will continue to participate in the existing electoral system.

The inclusion of Muslim Dalits into SC list will strengthen Dalit unity, which is secular in nature. In addition, the OBC Muslims under the existing Mandal scheme enjoy the benefits of reservation on the basis of their socio-economic status. …This is justifiable on the basis of Indian secularism. …The state should also recognize the common problem of all Muslims such as communalism and protect the minority rights given in the Constitution… There should be some general schemes to deal with the issues of poor Muslim Asharafs.

Finally, the question of political representation is also linked to social reform. I argue that the inter-caste marriages should be encouraged among Muslims in order to break the rigid social boundaries established by the caste system. Thus, the reservation in job empowers the Muslim Pasmanda/Dalit groups to develop a secular educated leadership, the inclusion of Muslim Dalits into the SC list will make it legal-constitutional, and finally the social reform agenda will create awareness to move forward.

 

Asaduddin Owaisi⁷

Muslims as a political community: The Indian Muslim is one who believes in Allah and the prophethood of Muhammad. At the same time, he/she is a citizen of India. So there is no contradiction between Muslim identity and Indian identity. Islam is my religion and India is my nation. …The formation of Muslim political identity is linked to the Partition of India. Muslims decided to stay back in India and completely rejected the idea of Pakistan. They wanted a secure future, protection of their life, property and religion. The Indian Constitution assured them that they would be treated as a religious minority and their religious, social and political rights would be legally recognized. So, it was a conscious political choice of Indian Muslims which persuaded them to participate in the democratic political process as a political community…

However, the priorities of Muslims have now changed. They want development, education and greater political participation. Education is a good example. Muslims have recognized the value of education. They now want good quality education for their children so that the next generation of Muslims can have a better future.

Babri Masjid is a religious emotional issue. As a religious person I want that the mosque to be rebuilt on that place. But this should not be seen as the sole Muslim concern. The substantive issues, such as education and employment, are the real political issues. One cannot ignore them because unlike emotional issues, these are linked to the everyday life of the people. So, the politics of our times is governed by the issues of development. Muslims in India want more Muslim political representation so that these concerns could adequately be addressed.

Caste among Muslims is a political reality, particularly in North India, which cannot be ignored. The rise of Dalit Muslim groups is a new development in this regard. …Dalit Muslim demand for reservation under Article 341 is a valid demand, which should be supported by all Indian Muslims. Article 340 of the Constitution is a highly communal one. This has to be amended. In my opinion, the struggle of the Dalit/Pasmanda Muslims is a legal one, because it is all about amending the Constitution. However, the Muslim struggle for social justice is a much broader concern. The Dalit Muslim struggle is a part of this larger agenda.

 

On political representation and social justice: Muslims must have adequate representation at every level of the political system – panchayat, municipality, state assembly, Lok Sabha. Political empowerment can help us in eradicating illiteracy and poverty. So, Muslim representation is a national issue. …It is important to have some crucial changes in the existing electoral system for the proper representation of castes and communities in the legislative bodies. I strongly support the proportional representation system based on the principle of democratic equality.

There are a number of Muslim leaders in different political parties. Do these leaders represent the genuine aspiration of Muslims? I do not think so. These leaders are kept in these political parties as symbols. These Muslim leaders are doing nothing for the empowerment of the community. In my opinion, a Muslim political party is a possible option for Muslims.

Muslim representation through a Muslim political party will strengthen Indian democracy. …A Muslim political party will represent the interests of Muslims because it would be in a position to understand Muslim grievances. It would also have a political language by which these grievances could be adequately represented in the public sphere. …The relationship between Islamic law or Sharia and the proposed Muslim political party should be understood properly. I am not saying that the proposed Muslim political party will impose Sharia. On the contrary, I argue that this political party would be based on democratic secular principles. It will work within our electoral system and make efforts to strengthen our secular ethos.

This Muslim political party should emerge from below; it should be led by young educated Muslim leaders who come from the grassroots, who have a mass base and who really want to address the real issues facing the Muslims. The question of political accountability is very crucial in this case.

It is often said that political organizations based on religion would be communal organizations. This argument in the present context simply means that only if Muslims recognize the so-called secular parties as their guardians, they would be treated as secular. The moment Muslims say that they want an exclusive Muslim political party, they become communal. If this is the case, than there should be a national debate on secularism in India.

The 2009 Lok Sabha election should be seen in this context. The Muslims have given support to Congress/UPA mainly because the Sachar report had a great impact on their psyche. The findings of Sachar were disseminated and discussed at all levels. Muslims for the first time in the history of post-independence India found that the government had officially recognized their backwardness. Now Muslims would like to see the implementation of the recommendation of the Sachar report. Interestingly though, the Congress did not fully acknowledge the findings of Sachar in this election. If the UPA fails to implement the recommendation of the Sachar report, more and more UDF/MIM/IUML kind of Muslim political groups will emergence, precisely because Muslims in India want development with political representation.

 

Footnotes:

1. There are 28 Muslim MPs in the 15th Lok Sabha.

2. I use term legal-constitutionalists for those political leaders and intellectuals who recognize the Indian Muslim community as an identifiable religious minority and envisage its appropriate representation in legislative bodies so as to ensure the implementation of the constitutional provisions related to minority rights. Iqbal Ansari has been working on this line of argument for a long time. The recent debate was also initiated by Ansari who issued a statement through the Minorities Council of India on 18 May 2009. He notes: ‘While welcoming the Indian people’s decisive verdict against the BJP led NDA, we would like the fellow citizens to note that only 28 Muslims have been elected to the 15th Lok Sabha, whereas according to their share in population they could have expected 72 MPs.’

3. The resolution adopted by the recent Muslim Convention on Reservation clearly recognizes the term Dalit Muslims and demands that Muslim Dalits should also be included in the SC list. See Resolution of the Muslim Convention for Reservation, 2 February 2009, Delhi.

4. Ex-MP, Lok Sabha, Editor, Muslim India, Ex-President, All India Majlis-e-Mushawarat.

5. Ex-MP Rajya Sabha, Editor, Nai Duniya (Urdu weekly).

6. MP Rajya Sabha (Bihar) Janata Dal (United), Founder President, All India Pasmanda Muslim Mahaz, formed in 1998.

7. MP, Lok Sabha Hyderabad (Andhra Pradesh ), All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimmen(AIMIM).