Representation, Equal Opportunity

In this second piece of a 2-article series on the performance of United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government at Centre DR MANZOOR ALAM tries to figure out where it stands on the basic values of democracy.

Here are some ruminations on where the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) ruling at the Centre stands in terms of the fundamental democratic values of popular participation and representation in decision-making processes and institutions, and whether it has been able to initiate moves to ensure equal opportunity (at least in principle) for common people. It is quite legitimate to address these questions today to the UPA government which has crossed the half-a-year mark in saddle.

To begin with an apparently inconsequential point (which is not really inconsequential), the UPA government has not allowed the drumming up of anti-Muslim hysteria by the political sections deriving mileage out of it. We are no longer hearing boasts about “successful experiments in Gujarat laboratory”. For basic democratic values like equality before law and equality of opportunity to take hold and thrive it is important that all campaigns of demonisation against particular sections of society are stopped. Such campaigns and policies behind them are based on a denial of the vital principle of equality before law, because only after ignoring this principle one section of society can vilify and demonise others.

Moving on from this basic value we can try to see whether the UPA government has taken real administrative, political and legislative measures to ensure that this principle is put into practice. As students of history know well all pogroms and genocides begin with hate campaigns, it is essential to curb all hate speech through appropriate laws and strict enforcement as a primary measure to curb violence against minorities and other weaker sections. It is reassuring to know that the UPA government intends to bring comprehensive legislation to control communal riots. We would like to have more effective legislation (and enforcement) against hate speech and anti-minorities propaganda to make any legislation against communal violence meaningful.

Any society where a quarter of the population is being constantly put under pressure and fear of communal, casteist and ethnic violence cannot claim itself to be really free or democratic. As Newsweek International editor and policy thinker Fareed Zakaria observes in his Future of Freedom, merely conducting periodic elections does not make a country democratic. For democracy to be really meaningful people have to feel secure and perpetrators of violence have to be forced to seek other ways of coming to power than through organised violence.

What kind of a political agenda a government has is important, but what is more important is who is running the government. We don’t expect from Sardar Manmohan Singh a statement like his predecessor Atal Behari Vajpayee’s at the height of Gujarat violence, that “Muslims create trouble wherever they are”, or his deputy L K Advani’s gem of wisdom in Tel Aviv that India would have had better ties with Israel had Muslims not interfered. The UPA leadership is not plagued by such mindset. Unlike the NDA it does not want to have better ties with China, Russia and Israel just because “they too have a Muslims problem”. The UPA so far has stayed away from such viciousness that only marginalises the weak and increases inequality.

There are quite a few harms inflicted by the NDA government that have to be undone in the interest of democratic fairplay and inequity. The principle of equality before law cannot be implemented if one section of society is booked under ordinary laws and another under draconian laws for the same offence. That Muslims were booked under the draconian POTA in the Godhra case and Sangh activists involved in Gujarat genocide booked under ordinary laws has been pointed out not by Indians alone but by such people as former US President Bill Clinton as well. Mr Clinton went to the extent of declaring that India could not hope to become a great power by booking the Godhra accused under the “draconian POTA” (Mr Clinton’s words) and the genocide accused under ordinary laws.

Although POTA has been removed from the statute, it has not been scrapped with retrospective effect as suggested by human rights activists and jurists. The result is that even today people are languishing in jails booked und this unconstitutional law created by the BJP-led NDA with the express intent of tormenting Muslims. Little wonder that virtually all POTA victims are Muslims. The government has not done anything to alleviate the problems of these people who have been unjustly victimised, although eminent public persons have been demanding action to undo the unjustice. The latest appeal to this effect came on January 28 when 73 eminent persons signed a declaration in New Delhi demanding release of POTA detenues in Godhra.

Although the present government has tried to undo some of the mischief in areas like education (as discussed in my first article of this series), far more serious harms are still to be undone. For instance, we have the Group of Ministers Report on national security presented in the NDA regime. In this report Muslims and their institutions have been vilified as threat to national security. By dint of being a document prepared by a senior cabinet ministers’ group this mischievous document has immense potential for harming Muslim in the long run. It is time to seriously consider steps to undo this malicious move.

The above are largely issues of erasing the mischief of the NDA government. However, there are some more serious concerns to be addressed by the UPA government for institutionalising adequate representation of all sections of society at all levels of legislature, executive and judiciary. As study after study conducted by the IOS (and other major national institutions) show Muslims are drastically under-represented in every field. The reasons for this are legion, both internal and external. However, there are certain problems which can easily be solved by the state once it decides to act on the basis of fairplay.

For instance, in several areas of sizeable Muslim population their electoral strength has been diluted through the administrative sleight of hand known as gerrymandering. The assembly and parliamentary constituencies are re-organised and manipulated in such a manner that Muslim majority areas are sliced off in several parts and lumped together with neighbouring non-Muslim areas, thus reducing their electoral influence drastically. Administrative tactics like this have to be prevented and in cases where gerrymandering has already taken place, should be reversed.

Only through administrative and political fairplay can the minorities and other weaker sections be helped to claim their rightful place. A fair-minded government that wants to empower the weak has a great role to play. It has not only to do justice but be seen to be doing justice.

As we know, only like represents like. As Indian citizens cannot represent a British constituency in Britain’s parliament (because an Indian citizen in this context in unlike a British citizen), Muslim interests cannot be watched as effectively if others represent them. In every field Muslims and other weaker sections themselves will have to be allowed to take their share in governance, polity, economy and society at large. For a just and democratic order to grow in India the state has to play a pro-active role. The UPA has a historic opportunity to steer this country towards a truly a democratic future. It has done well so far, but if has to do more to be credible.g

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