India’s ‘unity in diversity’ is a distant folklore, reality is depressingly insular

For all our diversity, Indians are depressingly insular. Housing colonies are built for particular communities, and residents there resist the entry of anyone else. This phenomenon got legal validity in 2006, when a Mumbai court issued a permanent injunction against the sale of flats to non-Parsis in the city's largest Parsi Colony. 

Unfortunately, this insularity has only grown since. From keeping other communities out, we now keep those with different food habits out too.

No one is better placed to slam the door on ‘others’ than those who constitute the majority in any given area. Currently, a section of those who constitute the majority are exercising this power with a vengeance, as evident from recent incidents across India.

Not that this is new. This author grew up in a colony built by a Sindhi for Sindhis. It was understood that no owner would sell their flat to a Muslim. The reason? The fear that ‘they’ would ‘abduct our daughters’. This was 20 years after Partition; and this unwritten, discriminatory rule was made by Sindhis who'd been forced to flee Sindh. Today, the same reason is being given to keep Muslims out, by people who never saw Partition.

The way this idea is being expressed today is also different. At that time, it was articulated behind closed doors. Today, groups of residents pose in front of TV cameras to declare that ‘Love jihad’ was bound to take place if a Muslim came to live among them. Not only is this a feudal idea, which regards daughters as community property, but it also exists in the 21st century, and now has a name. To our shame, the term ‘love jihad’ that stigmatises our largest minority has been propagated by India's ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and made commonplace by its mainstream media.

But this is not the only difference between the bigotry then and now. 

Two recent incidents from Bareilly and Muzaffarnagar show how alarming the prejudice that has always existed against Muslims has become. The reasons given by some Hindu residents for keeping Muslims out of their colonies in these cities range from the latter's dietary habits to them ‘running errands at night while talking on their phones’. This practice, apparently, endangers the Hindu housewives who sit out and gossip till 1 am. 

It should be noted here that Muslims constitute 40% of the population both in Bareilly and Muzaffarnagar. In addition, the 19th Century Barelvi movement, to which the majority of Indian Muslims owe allegiance, originated in Bareilly, and the Bareilly Sharif dargah is visited by both faiths. Hindus in these cities, therefore, cannot be unfamiliar with Muslim practices. 

Yet, in Muzaffarnagar, the sight of Friday afternoon namaz being performed by workers inside the house bought by a Muslim, was enough for the Hindus to voice conspiracy theories about the possibility of forced conversion and weapons being brought for riots.

In both cities, the Hindus alleged, falsely, that the purchase was illegal. They also predicted that the entry of one Muslim would result in a rapid Muslim takeover of the colony. 

In Bareilly, the opposition to a Muslim buyer came from a colony of lawyers, a category of professionals in Uttar Pradesh that has been displaying its fanaticism since 2005, beating up a Muslim terror accused inside court and passing resolutions barring their members from representing these accused. Hardly surprising then that the most vocal among those determined to keep Muslims out of his colony was the former secretary of the Bareilly Bar Association. Not only did he raise the bogey of Bangladeshis, but he added a new one: of ‘Assamese’. “The ‘PM and the CM’ had said that ‘Bangladeshis and Assamese should not be allowed to spread’,” he stated.

Remember the RPF jawan who, after fatally shooting two Muslims in a train last year, invoked the PM and the UP CM? That's the essence of the difference between the bigotry before and after 2014. The go-ahead for such thinking, which regards fellow citizens as invaders to be driven away, and sees their way of worship as a crime, comes from the very top.

Given this, it would be foolish to expect those in government to intervene, invoking constitutional rights and criminal provisions. In both cases, only the police have intervened, with the expected results: both Muslim buyers sold or decided to sell off their new homes. 

Why didn't the two ex-CMs of UP, Akhilesh Yadav and Mayawati, intervene? The Muzaffarnagar seller was a Dalit who'd tried for five years to sell his home to these very ‘upper caste’ neighbours who drove the Muslim buyer away. Imagine the mindset of children growing up in these ghettos. Why doesn't that spectre disturb our ‘secular’ leaders?

(Jyoti Punwani is a senior journalist. Author's X handle: @jyotipunwani.)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.