Communalism and Casteism in Electoral Politics:
Communalism and Casteism are two sides of the same coin:
The 13th Lok Sabha election appears to be moving India towards a bi-polar polity. It is a healthy sign. But the way the opportunistic combination of castes, religious and regional groups are emerging simply for the sake of grabbing political power raises a big question: whether our political leaders are adhering to the basic features of Indian constitution or taking the nation further to a chaotic condition? Mushrooming of caste associations has now become the bane of Indian politics, but our political rulers instead of taking a lesson from the history continue to play communal/caste politics. The unity shown by our people during Kargil operations is proof enough that the Indians are basically patriotic. In peacetime our political leaders, unfortunately start playing divisive politics for their personal gains.
The British legacy:
The British rulers had devised a system of separate electorates based on religion, caste and race (Indian Council Act of 1909 and Government of India Act 1919) in order to intensify the division of Indian society and weaken the Independence movement. Keeping in mind this evil design of the Britishers and the multi faceted structure of Indian society, the framers of the Indian constitution did away with these Acts after Independence and unity, integrity of the nation and secularism were incorporated as basic features of the Constitution, for governance of the country. But even after governing ourselves for more than half a century we are yet to overcome the hang over of divisive designs of the Britishers. The problems relating to caste and religion have become so acute that no political leader or party dare to contest the election without manoeuvring a combination of caste and religious groups in the constituencies.
Divisive Politics to the fore:
With the beginning of political competition for power, the leaders who were identified with freedom movement started exploiting the religious, caste, language and sectarian sentiments of the people. Provision for reservation to certain number of seats for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes in parliament and state assemblies as well as in government jobs and its gradual extension after every ten years were viewed by a section of population as an attempt to create a permanent division in the society on caste lines. Similarly, the politics of majority versus minority played by the political rulers was another attempt to divide the country on the basis of religion. Unfortunately, the situation gradually deteriorated from bad to worse and reached its nadir when a former Prime minister created a caste-war situation in the country through implementation of Mandal Commission report. Our political leaders who swear in the name of Indian constitution have forgotten its spirit and basic features and are making continued efforts to capture political power by dividing the country on the basis of caste, religion, language, sect and region.
Presently there are 120 reserved parliamentary constituencies including 79 for Scheduled castes and 41 for Scheduled tribes in the country. All the major political parties have released the election manifesto of their respective parties for the 13th Lok-Sabha poll but none of them has pledged to take any step to eradicate the on going caste and communal politics in the elections. Instead of doing away with this system, demand from divergent groups for reservation for religious minorities and OBCs (other backward classes) in parliament and state legislative assemblies is gaining ground to get political mileage during elections. Though, there is no formal reservation of any constituency for religious minorities in the country, there are several constituencies with heavy concentration of Muslims, Sikhs and Christians which are invariably represented by the respective communities. We may identify such constituencies in Kerala and Punjab. Similarly, there are a number of constituencies where the candidates are selected by the political parties from the dominant castes who maintain political hegemony in the constituency. Such constituencies could be easily identified in most of the States in the country. If Bhumihars, Rajputs, Kayasthas and Brahmins (all upper castes) could manipulate their political hegemony in Bihar till 1984 elections, now it is the turn of backward castes (OBCs) under the leadership of dominant Yadavas who have made the State their domain. Similarly, the OBCs in eastern U.P. and Jats in western part of the state, Patels and Rajputs in Gujarat, neo-Buddhists and Marathas in Maharashtra, Reddys, Khammas and Kapus in Andhra Pradesh, Lingayats and Vokkaligas in Karnataka, Thevars, Vanniyars, Pallars in Tamil Nadu, Jat Sikhs in Punjab, Christian, Muslims, Ezhavas and Nairs in Kerala are the known dominant religious and caste groups who maintain their political hegemony during elections. The Muslims form a majority in 10 parliamentary constituencies and have 20 to 50 percent of the voters in another 84 parliamentary constituencies in the country. As a result, the leaders of most of the political parties are found paying obeisance to the prominent clergies of the community during elections.
Political power by any means:
If we look behind the electoral history of the country, it is found that our political leaders instead of strengthening the country are gradually weakening it for the sake of sharing political power by dividing the society on the basis of caste, religion, sect etc. Now the situation has reached such a stage that the Indian voters with short memory forget the issues raised by political parties from one election to another but they hardly forget the caste, creed or religion of a candidate or the alignment of political parties with the respective groups. Since caste is a reality in Indian society and India was partitioned on the basis of religion, the political parties started playing caste and communal politics right from the day of Independence. Secularism means different things to different people.In the language of Indian politics, the word secularism means the willingness of Hindus to accept the right of the Muslims to maintain their personal community law, use of Urdu and preservation of Islamic institutions but to them, the divisive caste politics in the majority community can go on. For the Congress Party, secularism refers to the willingness of the Government to be the protector of Muslims against hostility and violence on the part of Hindus but they have no qualms in exploiting one caste against another for maximising their seats. For the BJP secularism means justice for all and appeasement to none. The Communists instead of defining the meaning of this word, accused the BJP as communal and Congress as authoritarian. The Socialists always made special appeal to the backward castes on the ground that in Indian society the interests of castes and classes coincide.
Use of religion and caste in elections:
Though, the use of religion or caste as a vote catching device during elections is a corrupt practice under the Representation of the People Act 1951, the fact remains that these factors have been playing an important role over the years in deciding the fate of the candidates in elections. A number of petitions containing allegations against the returned candidates for using caste and religion, are either dismissed by various courts or pending in absence of substantial evidence. The low rate of urbanisation linked with the low literacy rate, unemployment and under-employment made the political parties realise that the political ideology alone cannot mobilize the voters and thus religion, caste, region and sect became handy tools for their exploitation during elections. In 1949 at the instance of Congress rulers the statue of "Ram Lala" was locked in Ayodhya, the Government of the same party put "shilanyas" of the temple in 1996 when it was unlocked by the orders of the court. Initially, the Congress Party enjoyed the support of almost all the communities particularly the upper castes due to their leadership in freedom movement, Dalits due to their regard for Mahatma Gandhi and Muslims for their insecurity complex but gradually the upper castes got divided for the sake of sharing political power.
A typical example is Bihar State where the Congress Party developed a crack on caste lines giving rise to factionalism. In 1957, the defeat of A.N.Sinha, a Rajput by caste by Dr.S.K.Sinha of Bhumihar caste during a contest for the leadership of Congress Legislative Party in Bihar Assembly divided the party to such an extent that the Rajputs started deserting the party. Later K.B.Sahay belonging to Kayastha community and B.N.Jha, a Brahmin aggravated the factionalism in the party. Frequent mobility of one caste group to another for the sake of sharing power gave a clear indication that politicians were swayed more by self-interest than by group commitment. In Tamil Nadu, unity among non-Brahmins led to the rise of DMK but now each of them claiming to be the champion of its own community has begun to assert its place and is demanding special concession. PMK leader Mr. Ramdoss of Vanniyar community has now switched over from his extreme Tamil nationalist, non-Brahmin, and anti-North rhetoric to a patriotic, pan-Indian position. In Kerala, the Christians, and Nairs were initially the main contenders for power. Subsequently, Muslims and Ezhavas jumped into the fray and are playing a dominant role in State politics.
The BJP:
The Bhartiya Jan Sangh, which gave a call for unity of Hindus irrespective of their castes, was branded as a communal party by their political opponents. Initially, it remained an urban based party confined to north India with its influence in business community. Gradually it attracted the support of upper castes and has extended the influence of the party in almost all the parts of the country. Since, India as such, is a country of social coalition, the BJP leadership as a part of its strategy has temporarily put its contentious agenda of Ram temple at Ayodhya, abrogation of Article 370 and Uniform Civil Code in the back burner. The party ideologue and General Secretary K.N.Govindacharya in a press interview (Times Of India dated August 23`99) said, "We work with a bifocal vision. We are neither breaking out of our commitment to those issues nor are we apologetic about our stand." He added, "With the BJP yet to traverse some more distance to attain the steering position in Indian politics, we decided that in this interregnum of transition we should commit ourselves to the document of the national agenda for governance formulated on the basis of consensus among all the partners of the NDA." The Prime Minister, A.B.Vajpayee expressed his anguish against this statement of his party`s General Secretary and yet could not free himself either from the caste factor. While addressing an election meeting in Rajasthan on August 24 he said, "if re-elected, his Government would seriously debate the issue of granting reservation to Jats." On one hand he snubbed his partymen for taking on the "communal" agenda and on the other he spoke in favour of caste agenda to appease a particular caste in Rajasthan.
Religion and Caste have become a way of political life in India. Come elections, the use of communal and caste politics gets intensified. When election results are decided on the basis of "first past the post", numbers count. Is there a way out?
R.Upadhyay 29.8.99
(The writer is a Regional Adviser to SAAG)
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