Wahhabis should leave Ajmer dargah alone (Sunday Guardian)

By M D Nalapat 

The number of Wahhabis in India is far below than in Indonesia, or in Pakistan. 

 

Since the Al Saud family, which is in control of the country named after them, opened the money tap to Wahhabi institutions and personages in 1979, this school of thought has established its dominance within the theological sphere. In the process, it has replaced more inclusivist schools of thought and worship in institutions patronised by the Sunni Muslim community across the globe. Over the years, the type of theological literature available to more than a billion believers across the world has undergone a transformation. Whereas till 1979, almost all such literature commonly accessed highlighted the moderation and conciliatory spirit that is inherent in the very word “Islam”, by 1989 (when the Soviet Union lost the Afghanistan war to Pakistan-supported Wahhabi irregulars) that situation was reversed, with extreme and regressive tracts becoming commonplace, even while the earlier tracts disappeared from circulation. Place of worship after place of worship, religious institution after religious institution, was either newly built or existing ones taken over by those who pledge allegiance to the Wahhabi interpretation of theology. Not coincidentally, this process was facilitated by the hundreds of billions of US dollars lavished on the Wahhabi International by donors in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE and multiple other countries, including the US and the UK. Interestingly, because of the military alliance between the US and the Wahhabi irregulars fighting in Afghanistan, intelligence agencies in Washington, London and other capitals spent considerable amounts of money producing tracts and textbooks that endorsed and glorified the Wahhabi worldview. It took the terrorist outrage of 9/11 sixteen years ago to make at least some minds in those capitals wonder if it was wise to show such munificence to what has always been a deadly foe of the civilisational values of the democracies, albeit one skilled in forming tactical alliances with western powers that result in a boost to Wahhabi reach and capability.

The largest Muslim communities in the world are in Indonesia and India, and Wahhabi groups have sought to make that particular school of thought as dominant in these two moderate countries as they are in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and such other states. Wahhabism has made considerable headway in Indonesia, so much so that organisations that were previously anchored to the syncretic traditions of that country are being taken over by more exclusivist groups. The process of “radicalisation creep” received a boost in 2002 from the separation of East Timor from Indonesia, a split that was agreed to by that country’s leadership in much the same way as India’s leaders acquiesced in the 1947 Partition. The vivisection created a perception within the Muslim majority that if Christians formed a majority in any part of the archipelago, they would want to separate from Jakarta. Should the Hindu-majority island of Bali go the way of East Timor later, that would both be a consequence of the steady growth of Wahhabi influence in Indonesia, as well as a trigger for even faster development of that theology in what would be left of Indonesia after such a split. As yet, the moderates who truly represent the true ethos of Islam are still in control of Indonesia, but they are under siege and their future is uncertain. Fortunately, India is in a relatively better position, the Muslim community in our country being robustly committed to secular values and to inclusivist modes of thought and action. Although there does exist a growing number of followers in India of Abd-el-Wahab (1703-1792), the founder of the school of thought named after him, as yet that number is far below that found in Indonesia and exponentially less than in Pakistan since Zia-ul-Haq was in charge three decades and more ago. In Pakistan, Wahhabism is in the ascendant, while the moderates are close to irrelevance. However, in India a similar effort is being challenged by a host of individuals and institutions, visible, for example, in the support, especially among Muslim women, for the call to abolish the system of Triple Talaq as practised in India.

An institution that for over a century has played a lead role in the battle against extremism and exclusivism is the dargah of Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti in Ajmer. Wahhabi groups have long chafed at the moderate message of the dargah and its titular head, Dewan Sahib Sayid Zainul Abedin, who is the descendant (across 22 generations) of “Garib Nawaz” himself. The Dewan Sahib has braved the wrath and worse of fanatics in holding to the message of peace that is at the core of Islam. But now his theological foes have struck, with his own brother Alauddin Alimi seeking to replace him and in effect, condemn the Dewan Sahib to death by labelling him an apostate to the Muslim faith. Why? Because Syed Zainul Abedin called for the voluntary eschewing of beef by the Muslim community as a gesture of fellowship towards those who abstain from consumption of bovine flesh. The Dewan Sahib also condemned India’s Triple Talaq practice as being contrary to the tenets of the Muslim faith. This call for moderation and communal harmony was enough for Alimi and his backers to seek to grab the seat of the Sajjadanashin, which by the rights established by tradition would go to son Naseeruddin Chisti after the passing away of Sayid Zainul Abedin. The contest that is taking place at the Ajmer dargah is of relevance to the whole of India, for the substitution of the present Sajjadanashin by an individual who does not share his peace-loving values would mark a grievous defeat for modern and moderate Muslims across India, indeed across the world. Alauddin Alimi must not succeed. The dargah should not go the way of so many other institutions in India and be lost to voices that both preach and practise inter-communal harmony. The Ajmer dargah must continue to remain the foremost example in India of the moderate and inclusivist traditions of a great faith.

http://www.sundayguardianlive.com/opinion/9001-wahhabis-should-leave-ajmer-dargah-alone 

SC acts to reduce drunk driving (Pakistan Observer)

M D Nalapat | Geopolitical Notes From India

The Indian Supreme Court has passed orders that have, for example, resulted in the closure of several swathes of industry, or changed the direction of policy in a way substantially different from what was intended by the government of the day. Recently, the Supreme Court ordered that the National Anthem should be played before every performance in every cinema hall, and of course, that the entire audience should stand at attention while it was being played. In a particular instance, a moviegoer was beaten up by others in the hall for not standing up while the anthem was being played.
It later transpired that he was physically challenged and hence could not stand up on his own, which was why he had remained seated. Since the order was passed, this columnist has been to only a single movie, whereas previously he used to see them more often. At that show, the hall was almost empty when the National Anthem suddenly began to be played. Only after a few seconds did the realisation of what was happening set in, so that this columnist sprung to his feet.
During those few seconds spent still sitting inadvertently on the chair when the anthem began, had the theatre been fuller, some moviegoers may have resorted to violence in the mistaken assumption that disrespect was being shown to the national anthem. Individuals who make no secret of their patriotic fervour are getting more plentiful these days, and are often in an aggressive mood towards those they regard as insufficiently committed to public demonstrations of undying love for the nation. There are, of course, those who have doubts about the efficacy of this order of the Supreme Court. Why, they ask, single out only movie theatres for mandatory playing of the National Anthem before the start? Why not in the field of sports as well?
Why not play the National Anthem before every football or cricket match, so that the entire stadium rises in unison and warms the hearts of the more patriotic of the spectators present ? Why not begin every day at school with the National Anthem? Of course, subsequent judgments may extend the now famous “Cinema Order” to sports and schools as well, so that every day and in numerous venues, citizen gets a chance to prove his or her patriotic fervour by standing at attention when the National Anthem gets played. While order to play the anthem in cinema theatres is designed to infuse patriotism within theatre-going public, another recent order of SC is meant to ensure that drunken driving gets curbed. This is being done through making it illegal for liquor to be procured within 500 metres of a highway. As a consequence of this decision, it is estimated that about six million jobs will be affected, and many of which may never come back. Those working in shops and hotels will be most affected.
In Gurgaon, for example, the Cyber Hub is 21st century in design, even while the ( state managed) roads outside the swanky buildings have more potholes than smooth services. Those in authority who would like to see a teetotal 21st century and who are lobbying to enforce the prohibition of alcohol across the are happy at the Supreme Court order. However, the many restaurants in the area are in crisis, and most are in danger of shutting down. And of course, there are the usual critics who ask why the order applies only to highways. Are there no drunken drivers on smaller roads, indeed, on country dirt tracks? Then why not ban liquor within 500 metres of these as well? And what if a drunken driver walks 500 metres and buys liquor before getting back to his vehicle? Would it not be better to impose a ban for 5000 metres, so that it would be almost impossible to walk to a liquor vend from the road? And of course, if any alcohol is consumed at that distance, by the time the drinker gets back to the vehicle, effects would have been sharply reduced by exertion involved in walking five kilometres back.
Others warn that some drivers carry alcohol in bottles with them, and so are unaffected by the ban. A suggestion made is to prescribe jail time, perhaps even life imprisonment, for all drivers of vehicles who are found with liquor on their person. There have been numerous studies to the effect that the environment is better served by a vegetarian diet. Out of consideration for the need to slow down global warming, the newly elected Uttar Pradesh government has decreed that all illegal meat shops must shut down. In effect, this means almost all shops, as the laws in India are so numerous and complex that almost every establishment (whether selling meat, fish, milk or vegetables) is technically “illegal”. The UP police have shut down such establishments with a zeal not usually visible in that force.
In a short while, the sale of liquor may also be banned, just as it has been in next door Bihar. The problem is that merely banning alcohol may not prevent its consumption. Only, the sale and profits will flow to mafias rather than to the exchequer, even while lives will be lost because of consumption of bootleg liquor. In case of Uttar Pradesh, state needs at least Rs 100,000 crores of investment in industry over the next eighteen years, with foreign countries having to meet part of the outlay. Problem is that in almost all these countries, meat is a staple dish, and investors will worry about coming to a state where even the suspicion that meat is being transported results in acts of violence. Reality is that all, repeat all, developed countries have given freedom to their citizens to eat what foods they prefer, wear what dress they like, and adopt lifestyle of their choice. In 21st century, such freedoms are even more desired by people.
However, in India the trend is in favour of the government and the courts ordering the citizen to adopt the habits that the authorities believe are essential to make the citizen a model. Almost every sphere of the life of a citizen is subject to such regulation. It will be interesting to see whether such a net of regulations and such a prescriptive system can generate the mindset and the initiative needed for rapid growth. SC of India must be congratulated for seeking to enhance patriotism and stop drunken driving, among other things. Hopefully the two path breaking decisions of the Court mentioned above will result in a country freed of the evil of drunk driving and an absence of patriotism. Time will tell.

 

http://pakobserver.net/sc-acts-to-reduce-drunk-driving/ 

India is Held Back by the Anti-Western Backwardness of her Ruling Brown Sahibs (The Conservative)

By M D Nalapat

In the thirty-fourth paragraph of his 1835 Minute  on  Education,  Thomas Babington Macaulay visualised the creation of a class of individuals “Indian in blood and colour but English in tastes, in opinions, in morals and in intellect”. Anchored to the worldview of his era, Macaulay declined to recommend that such individuals be given the same right as “blood and colour” English-men in ruling India. How-ever, because of Macaulay’s emphasis on the English language and his rejection of the view that education in India be confined to languages native to the land or to its previous conquerors, the Persians, within years hundreds and later, thousands and eventually hundreds of thousands of Indian subjects of the British Empire began to get a facsimile of the education available in parts of Britain.

Politicians and officials who

were the successors to the former British rulers transformed themselves into British colonial officers in attitude and behaviour, if not entirely in morals.

Unfortunately for Macaulay, knowledge of England’s language, history ­ and society ­ (and to a much lesser extent, science and technology) did not make the overwhelming majority of such students “English in tastes, opinions and intel-lect”, although more than a few did adopt the moral hypocrisies of the Victorian era, a tendency still flourishing in a country that has been presumed independent for 70 years.

Contrary to those in post-1947 India who argued that knowledge of English or familiarity with the ways of the people of that island would result in what Macaulay fore-cast – a walking away from India’s native traditions and ethos – most English-speaking Indians retained their affinity towards their own traditions, including in matters of cuisine and lifestyle, though a few did so only in the seclusion of their homes. Indeed, beginning in the 1890s, the higher echelons of the independence movement were composed of those who were educated in the manner that Macaulay had favoured. Across the subcontinent, the English language acted as an equaliser and a homogeniser, bringing together people from different regions, castes and religions, thereby enabling the Twentieth Century campaign for independence to be pan-Indian in scope in a way that the 1857 revolt – carried out in disconnected territorial segments and by uncoordinated entities – was not. Relatively few joined in the 1857 effort to throw out the British: most either remained passive or actively opposed the armed campaign against the Raj. The absence of education in a language that was neutral between one inhabitant of the subcontinent and another would have ensured the balkanisation of the subcontinent long before the colonial power packed its bags and sailed away.  

The development of commerce, the growth of the middle class (with its dilution of much of the caste, regional and sometimes even religious differences distinguishing citizens from one another), and the popularisation of English, from the trio of conditions that has ensured the unity of India.

Knowledge of the inter-national link language did not result in a metamorphosis of the Indian into a (tanned) Briton. However, once the Union flag was lowered from the Viceregal Palace and re-placed with the Indian Tri-colour, a metamorphosis did take place. This was the seeping into the psyches of the successors to the Raj that the colonial system remained as a continuum. As a consequence, the politicians and officials who were the successors to the former British rulers transformed themselves into British colonial officers in attitude and behaviour, if not entirely in morals, thereby fulfilling the wishes of Macaulay.

The consequence is that the present-day administration in the Union of India remains tethered to the pre-1947 postulate that the people of the country are unfit to exercise control over their own destinies – and that the government has to have the final word on almost any individual decision of consequence.

It needs to be remembered that the colonial practices of Britain were the opposite of what was carried out at home. If the British people could build an empire, the reason lay in the fact that they permitted much less intrusion into their lives from the Monarchy, taking over for themselves tranches of individual discretion un-known elsewhere on the continent of Europe. Individual Britons used this freedom to win colonies and come up with inventions, each of which they loyally ascribed to the monarch, although both knew such a claim to be a trifle inaccurate.

The post-Independence Government of India needed to accept that the people would be most productive in conditions that Prime Minister Narendra Modi characterised as “Mini-mum Government”. In-stead, what has persisted is a system of governance that in many particulars is even more restrictive than when India was ruled from London. If flights to Delhi from other big cities in India are full, the reason is that the national capital has in effect made the rest of the country its colony.

Officials and the politicians who technically oversee them distance themselves from the rest of the country much as the British in India did in the past, by separate rules and procedures applicable only to them, and by pomp more suited

to Middle Eastern royalty than to the elected leaders of the world’s most populous democracy.

Very little activity can be attempted by businesses, for example, without formal approval from the central government and its agencies. As for transparency in the pro-cesses of government, this remains much less evident in India than in other major democracies. Meanwhile, officials and the politicians who technically oversee them distance themselves from the rest of the country much as the British in India did in the past, by separate rules and procedures applicable only to them, and by pomp more suited to Middle Eastern royalty than to the elected leaders of the world’s most populous democracy.

Small wonder that the British-era focus on the collection of revenue is still regarded by the “post-colonial” bureaucracy as the central task of government. Without consideration of the effects on future growth, the potential short-term revenue-raising segments of the economy are assessed and matched against the year’s expenses of departments and projects. Wherever possible, additional revenues are squeezed out from private entities, in the process often stunting future growth.

India is probably the only country where the price of petrol at the pump has actually risen despite the cost of a barrel of oil falling to less than a third of the level it was four years ago, with the difference going in taxes and revenues to the state. Any sector showing impressive growth attracts a high tax demand, thereby slowing its expansion. An example is the services sector, which slowed down after taxes were first slapped on it in 1994, and by still more after taxes were increased in 2006 and again, particularly harshly, in 2012. Since then, tens of millions of jobs have been foregone in the sector, with the Narendra Modi government continuing the upward trajectory of tax rates and thereby stunting the growth of a sector crucial for the creation of jobs for the 11-13 million new entrants to the job market each year.

Collection of revenue was the central objective of the colonial state, and re-mains so for its successors, who too are fixated on them-selves rather than the people as a whole. Enterprises and individuals in India pay not only taxes to the exchequer but bribes to the pockets of the successors to the colonial bureaucracy. Even the most poverty-stricken stall-holder or handcart vendor has to pay the latter “rent”. And now, with measures such as the demonetisation of 86 per cent of the country’s currency by value, the formerly business-friendly Modi government is seeking to ensure that even those lurking on the boundaries of indigence pay at least some tax to the state beyond the bribes they are liable for. The level of “rent” in the form of bribes and looting of the economy by crony capitalists takes place on a scale that make British pickings in the era of Clive seem derisory.

Given the complex they developed on being “Brown Sahibs”, individuals from Nehru on down rejected any strategic alliance with the West, even while they themselves were far more comfortable in London than in Mumbai, far more themselves in New York than in Lucknow, and far happier to socialise with a European than a native of India. A geopolitical distance was created between the West and India by such individuals, despite the fact that a robust support of the Allies during the Second World War or with the US during the 1960s and beyond would have generated far better results than the policy choices actually pursued, which between 1939-45 gave MA Jinnah and his Muslim League an edge over the Congress Party in decision-making levels in White-hall and led to Partition.

The West-phobic policy continued by Indira Gandhi and her successors in the 1960s until 1984 prevented India from participating in the economic spinoff of geo-political events in the way Japan or South Korea did, or in membership of entities such as ASEAN. The closer the “inner selves” of India’s post-colonial (though hyper-colonial) rulers were to the West, the more they camouflaged that by keeping the country away from the Allies and in the orbit of the USSR. Only genuine nationalists (who incidentally remain fluent in English and in knowledge of the West), safely anchored in their traditions, were open in acknowledging the need for India and its Anglospheric partners in particular to work closer together, especially in matters of security.

Naturally, those seeking to prevent modernity (in the form of education in English or in the expansion and protection of individual freedoms on the scale seen in the US or the UK) are “Brown Sahibs”. They have allied themselves with troglodytes anchored to Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century ways to block the system from re-leasing the population from the constrictions of the state.

Both these groups share the view of their colonial-era predecessors that the people cannot run their own lives, and have therefore continued the pre-Independence practice of the state taking decisions that in more evolved governance systems has remained the prerogative of the individual. Instead of “mini-mum government”, what is seen is the reverse, a steady lowering of the threshold of individual freedoms, including speech. Even the Election Commission of India frowns on any expressions other than those that would be approved by the headmistress of a girls’ convent school.

In India, as during the British era, both government and the judiciary regard themselves as empowered to decide for the citizen on practically any matter. Getting rid of the adherence of the ruling establishment on colonial-era practices and powers is essential for the very survival of the nation. What India needs is another freedom struggle, this time in defence of those rights of the citizen that have been ignored by the post-colonial hyper-state throughout the seven decades of India’s “free” existence.

This article is available in the following pdf:

http://www.theconservative.online/tC-03.pdf

Please download the magazine, pages 69-73. 

http://theconservative.online/article/india_is_held_back_by_the_anti_western_backwardness_of_her_ruling_brown_sah