Pratap Bhanu Mehta
Indian Express, Friday, November 23, 2007
The aftermath of Nandigram is producing a combustible mix whose full ramifications will be felt for a long time. Although, the state government did the right thing by calling the army out, the festering sores that West Bengal’s political culture is producing will take a long time to heal. Nandigram had already exposed three major contradictions in CPM’s strategy. The party was under the naive illusion that the culture of violence and style of political agitation it used to secure power would not one day come to haunt its own government. It also ceded power to the party to such an extent that the party began to assault the formal institutions of the state. And it should be a matter of some concern that the party continues to launch a no-holds-barred attack on every constitutional office, from the governor to the judiciary, to the NHRC. But the violence in Kolkata has also brought out the extent to which the shadow of communalism still hovers over Indian politics, including West Bengal. Even though the violence has been contained, it would be extremely complacent to deny the gravity of the kind of politics the Kolkata agitation has opened up.
What is at stake? First, the very fact that disparate issues like Taslima Nasreen’s continuing residence in Kolkata and Nandigram were all mixed up in this protest suggests the possibility of communalisation of identities, where all kinds of unconnected issues are lumped into one seamless whole to create a singular narrative of community victimisation. What happened in Nandigram was appalling, but it is in some ways so reminiscent of state abdication elsewhere: think of Salwa Judum. The state government’s conduct in the Rizwanur case is reminiscent of so many sordid stories involving the rich and the powerful manipulating the state machinery to their advantage. And the Taslima Nasreen issue involves fundamental principles of what a free society is about. Each of these issues needs to be seriously discussed. But any society that does not manage to diagnose each issue for what it is, and instead gives rein to a politics of free association, where disparate grievances get lumped into community narratives is setting itself up for a disaster. And Bengal is beginning to inch towards that path. Whether the CPM will also now engage in a politics of free association, linking Nandigram to the nuclear deal remains to be seen.
The CPM needs to reflect on the history of its own conduct in the case of Taslima Nasreen. For most of us the matter is plain and simple. India should be a beacon of liberal freedoms. Occasionally the exercise of this freedom by artists is found to be offensive by particular groups. They are, in turn, free to criticise and argue with the literary production in question, but they cannot ask for it to be banned or have the liberties of the author curtailed. Further, India should have enough confidence in its values to provide a space for all those in the region being persecuted on political grounds. Instead what do we do? The CPM government, in the first instance, banned Dwikhandita (a ban overturned by the High Court). More recently, the Left tied itself in knots over the same issue. According to reports, an issue earlier this month of Pathsanket carried an article that defended Taslima Nasreen on the grounds that her views stemmed from a “scientific” outlook, and then went on to query episodes in Muhammed’s life. Even though this journal had tacit backing from the Left, this particular issue of the journal was banned and withdrawn from circulation after protests from the All India Minority Forum, one of the groups allegedly behind the Kolkata disturbances, and its leader Idris Ali.
Why is this tale relevant? First, because the protesters raised the Taslima Nasreen issue yet again. No matter what we think of Nandigram, groups that otherwise represent a danger to the freedom of expression should not be allowed to hijack the issue. Second, because states, from Gujarat to West Bengal, have at one time or the other succumbed to the pressure of groups that threaten our liberties in the name of community sensitivities, and the CPM is no exception. By so succumbing, we incite groups to foment violence.
If the Taslima Nasreen issue became an issue in street politics, the CPM is responsible for it to the extent that it has, in the past, not honoured the lakshman rekhas of a free society and emboldened those people who think freedom is a negotiable value. But the larger question is this: which political party will summon the courage to defend freedom over obscurantism? Each political party has, at one time or other, negotiated away freedom under pressure from their favourite group.
The third issue coming to the fore is that communalism can be suppressed, but cannot be eradicated by the political paradigm, within which so many secular parties operate. This paradigm has two strands: a politics of tokenism, on the one hand, that emboldens obscurantists; and an appalling failure to create real opportunities for advancement and integration of the minorities, on the other. Most parties are interested in maintaining a particular political equilibrium rather than engage in a politics of social transformation, where one’s identities become irrelevant to the rights and opportunities we have.
But we are now in a political climate where each political party is more interested in giving other parties a black eye than in soberly asking the question: How do we create a different kind of politics? None of the political parties have a minimally clear commitment to core constitutional principles that need to be defended at all costs. The profound social and economic changes Indian society is experiencing will produce conflict and dislocation. But this conflict is easier to manage if there is a clearer understanding of what our objectives are. Brilliant as Karl Marx was, he was fundamentally wrong about one thing: the trajectory by which social conflicts resolve themselves is not determined by some inherent logic in society. There is no automatic dialectical resolution waiting to happen. The CPM’s mistake is to fuel the fire inherent in social contradictions through a combination of moral vacuity, institutional double standards and playing footsie with constitutional values.
The politics of expediency is already threatening to shatter West Bengal’s hopes for a great transformation; it would be foolish to assume that this contagion cannot spread elsewhere.
(The writer is president, Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi)
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