15 March 2011
GAINING GHETTO-GROUND?
by Samina Mishra
“My father always said adaab, throughout his life,” she said, adjusting the slipping dupatta on her head, “He worked in Jamia till he died and that was the culture of Jamia. That is what we learnt in our childhood. But it has changed now. It is only now that I have understood how adaab is not the correct greeting. It’s ok with non-Muslims. But to a Muslim, you must always say assalaam waleikum. You know what it means? Peace be upon you. That is a good thing to say, no?”
For someone with a Muslim name who had just walked in saying adaab, perhaps, this was meant as a chastisement. I, too, learnt to say adaab as a child. Adaab and khuda hafiz, and have held on to both, despite a growing popularity of assalaam waleikum and allah hafiz. As the discourse around identity gets increasingly overpowered by simplistic and uni-dimensional articulations, I hold on to them, more fiercely. Perhaps, these are but fragments of a nostalgic past but I believe that the weakening presence of these greetings in our midst is linked to the hardening of positions – the voices that speak of “minority appeasement” and those that that seek to preserve “minority character” and bestow “minority status” on individuals and institutions.
Recently, Jamia Millia Islamia was granted minority status, a first for a central university. As someone who studied there, who has lived cheek by jowl with the university and has produced and hopes to continue to produce work there, I see this labelling as another link in a sad and growing chain that seeks to corral people. It is part of the transformation that builds malls and gated residential colonies, that issues identity cards and gate passes for domestic help to enter, that makes women believe they are expressing agency when they choose to keep the karva chauth fast or wear the veil. The culture of Jamia, no less vulnerable to the larger economic, social and political forces than other spaces in this country, was bound to change. And it seems that the direction of change is also in keeping with these globalised, multi-cultural times in which new borders are erected to deal with the bewildering dissolution of old ones. And so, while some seek to corral, others seek to stay corralled. After all, it’s much neater to stack people in boxes than to allow the free-flow of intersecting, messy lines.
Let me say at the outset that I am a privileged Muslim. My great grand-father was one of Jamia’s founders. My family has studied in Delhi’s best colleges and is active in national level politics. So, yes, I will never need reservation. However, I am not opposed to reservation per se. I believe that in the context of centuries of oppression, it can be meaningless to use “merit” as a qualifying tool, regardless of context. I also firmly believe that affirmative action is necessary to redress the long history of violence perpetrated by the caste system. But is Jamia’s minority status the same thing? For me, the answer is a big, resounding No.
The aim of caste based reservations is to scale exclusionary walls and introduce diversity into spaces where access has been denied, either in institutionalised or in informal ways. But the granting of a minority status to Jamia actually operates to erect walls and to make the space the preserve of the minority community – on the ground, of course, this will translate to certain sections of the minority community. By allowing the university to reserve 50% of the seats for Muslims, educational prospects for young Muslims may see an improvement and certainly, there is no doubt that this needs improvement. But will those improved educational prospects actually help those young men and women to go on to lead non-ghettoised lives? Will it make available for them jobs - both in the public and private sector - that have for so long been denied? Will it open up housing opportunities for them? Will it make financial credit easier?
There is a complex web of reasons that creates the sorry state of education among Muslims today. It is true that ordinary Muslims face shocking levels of discrimination in our country today. But the answer to that is not to create a walled-in ghetto. Physically, Jamia is the focal point of a growing landscape of housing projects, testament to the fact that housing is simply unavailable for Muslims in most other parts of Delhi. There are people here who would choose to live elsewhere, there are people who could afford to live elsewhere. But they do not. They live in the densely populated colonies like Abul Fazal Enclave and Zakir Nagar, and justify to themselves that they are among their “own”. And while “own” could be a dynamic interplay of class, language, district and religion, the diversity of the Muslim communities in India ends up being articulated only in terms of a simplistic, monolithic religious identity.
It is this that those who look in from the outside see. A sense of ‘own’ that may be many things but is certainly, predominantly Muslim. Thus, the ghetto is perpetuated. With the granting of minority status to Jamia, the physical ghetto finds its equivalent in the educational space. If you’re Muslim, you will find a college seat here more easily than you could elsewhere. Just as you can find an apartment here that you can’t elsewhere. So, the immediate need is taken care of and in the process, a sense of community is constructed. But, what about those desires that seek other forms of community, those existences that don’t conform to the constructions, those imaginations that search for new landscapes?
If we want to question the ways of seeing by those who look in, surely we need to question the ways of being by those who reside within.
In my wanderings in the neighbourhoods that surround the university, I encountered a family whose 12 year old daughter studies in the Jamia school. In the course of our conversation, the father told me why he had chosen Jamia for his daughter – mainstream education with a Muslim culture. Was it necessary, I asked him, for the school space to deliver the Muslim culture part of it? Was the domestic domain not enough for that? “Of course, that is possible,” he said, wryly, “But which good school will give us admission?”
There are thousands of stories of rejection and so, while some continue to brave the admission process for the mainstream private schools in the city, many don’t even try. Even getting into the Jamia school is not easy because of the numbers trying for it, and the growing demand has led to the mushrooming of private schools that peddle this marketable combination of English medium education and Islamic values. Hundreds of children in Jamia’s neighbourhoods go to these schools. They will spend their 12 odd school years with others, more or less, from similar backgrounds, taught by teachers from similar backgrounds, play with neighbours from similar backgrounds. Their only exposure to “difference”, as opposed to what is their “own”, will be the media and the malls – twin arms of the giant marketplace of liberalised India. With Jamia’s minority status, they can continue living that life, with meagre opportunities for engaging with the “other”. Perhaps, that is what is being sought. The lines have to be kept in place, the boxes neatly stacked. So, when France votes to make the wearing of the veil illegal and when minarets get banned in Switzerland, there is a small pocket in my corner of the world that will resonate. The ghetto will be perpetuated. The “other” neatly boxed in.
As for me, with my easy privileges, I will continue to say adaab and khuda hafiz. Indeed, in the narrative of transformation from adaab to assalam waleikum, lies an ugly, twisted history - of the Babri Masjid, of Gujarat and of many other spaces. But raising our voice against one cannot drown out the silence on the other.
Samina Mishra / March 2011
**********
Samina Mishra is a documentary filmmaker and writer. Her film, The House On Gulmohar Avenue, is set in the neighbourhoods around Jamia Millia Islamia.
