The Times of India
25 December 2003
True secularism against overt display of religiosity
In India , we've grown so used to hypocrisy and half-truths that when we are confronted with the truth we can't see it for what it is.
And so it is with the French decision and the idea of secularism that underlies it. For India 's liberal elite, of course, secularism means something quite different from what it means to the French and indeed rest of the world.
It is not about the separation of church from state or religion from politics but the enthusiastic participation of state functionaries in all matters of faith. We've even got ourselves a weighty Sanskrit neologism to describe this desi corruption.
It's called sarvadharmasamabhava. In theoretical terms, it means that the Indian state is obliged to accord equal respect to all religions in public policy.
In practical terms, it translates into the most unseemly displays of religiosity by our political class: From ministers prostrating at the feet of self-styled godmen to leaders inaugurating their political campaigns at one or another place of worship.
And these, remember, are the less harmful examples of our secularism.
Think of Ayodhya and Gujarat and you get to the real mess that the Indian version of secularism, with its unthinking mixing of religion and politics, has produced. Yes, context and motive are important criteria in assessing any political decision.
But before we apply these standards to the recent French edict banning all markers of religious identity in state-run schools, let's apply them to our own sorry secular experiment.
Besides, any talk of context in the French case must take into account the country's proud republican tradition - of equality, liberty and fraternity - in which the state relates to individuals not as members of this or that community but as equal citizens.
Take away that history and no French citizen, much less a Muslim, would have the right to make the kind of criticism that he has so self-righteously directed against the banning of hijab in state-run schools.
|
